Barrio Urbanism

Barrio Urbanism

Barrio Urbanism Chicanos, Planning, and American Cities

David R.Diaz

ROUTLEDGE NEW YORK AND LONDON

Published in 2005 by Routledge Taylor & Francis Group 270 Madison Avenue New York, NY 10016 Published in Great Britain by Routledge Taylor & Francis Group 2 Park Square Milton Park, Abingdon Oxon OX14 4RN © 2005 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis Group This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to http://www.ebookstore.tandf.co.uk/.” ISBN 0-203-02096-0 Master e-book ISBN

International Standard Book Number-10:0-415-94541-0 (Print Edition) (Hardcover) 0-415-94542-9 (Print Edition) (Softcover) International Standard Book Number-13:978-0-415-94541-7 (Print Edition) (Hardcover) 978-0-415-94542-4 (Print Edition) (Softcover) No part of this book may be reprinted, reproduced, transmitted, or utilized in any form by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying, microfilming, and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without written permission from the publishers. Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Diaz, David R., 1951– Barrio urbanism: Chicanos, planning, and American cities/David Ralph Diaz. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-415-94541-0 (hb: alk. paper)—ISBN 0-415-94542-9 (pb: alk. paper) 1. Mexican Americans—History. 2. Urban policy— United States—History. 3. City planning— United States—History. 4. Land use, Urban—United States—History. 5. Hispanic American neighborhoods—History. I. Title. E184.M5D525 2004 307. 1′16′0896872073–dc22 2004016283

Visit the Taylor & Francis Web site at http://www.taylorandfrancis.com and the Routledge Web site at http://www.routledge-ny.com Emilio Cervera and the El Centro collective of the late 1970s. Don Emilio, it was a pleasure and an honor to struggle under your direction against a rancid, racist city, Pasadena, California. The history of barrio Villa Parke is forever indebted to your courage and tenacity. And of course, Francine Marie, Bobby Ryder, and Padrino Ralph, I know you’re floating on a coastal cloud, drinking Chardonnay together. I’m jealous.

Contents

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Preface

PART I History of Chicana/o Residential Patterns 1 Introduction: The Structural Influence of Chicanas/os on Spatial Relations in the Cities of the Southwest 2 The Early History of Chicana/o Urban and Locational Patterns in the Southwest, 1880–1945 3 Barrio Logic and the Consolidation of Chicanas/os in the City: 1945– 1975 4 Transformation of Regional Culture and the Impact of Civil Rights Reforms on Racist Real Estate and Banking Industry Practices: 1975– 2000 PART Major Urban Issues and the Chicana/o Community II 5 Housing Policy and the Crisis of Affordability in the Southwest

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6 Economic Development in Chicana/o Communities

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7 Open Space and Recreation

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8 Redevelopment Policy in the Barrio

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PART Land Use and Politics Arena in the Post-World War II Suburban III Expansion 9 The History of Confrontational Urban Politics: A Reliance on Social Movements 10 The Politics of Environmental Justice in the Southwest

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11 The Political and Social Transformation of California

204

183

PART IV The Future of Urban Policy in the Southwest 12 The New Cities of the Southwest

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13 Political Coalitions, Chicanas/os, and the Question of Urban Policy

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14 Chicanas/os and the Urban Challenges of the Twenty-First Century

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Appendix

268

Bibliography

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Index

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Preface

No project occurs in a vacuum. Time and space, along with social location, influence a writer’s perspective and approach to history, especially an arena of urban analysis that has been historically marginalized by my field: city and regional planning. Those influences are personal, as a carpenter’s son actually building part of Southern California since early childhood; a professional, in city government, the political universe; and an academic, attending a racist urban planning program in the 1970s (UC Berkeley) and a somewhat progressive program in the late 1980s (UCLA). The history presented in this book also has linkages to calles en el barrios, social actors in public housing developments, barrio leaders confronting racist government institutions, a reactionary planning profession, and individuals who had the courage to struggle, all during an early period of professional experiences. Of particular importance was a four-year period in which a small politically marginalized organization, El Centro de Accion Social, confronted one of the most repressive and racist city governing structures in the history of Southern California— Pasadena. It was during this experience that I encountered Emilio Cervera, a crusty contrarian who was the acknowledged barrio leader. He only had a high school education, was injured during World War II, had a career in the forestry service, a limp from his injury in the war, and, more importantly, a boundless sense of spirit to struggle and courage to confront power. I assume, or hope, that many progressives from the 1960s had the opportunity to learn from history directly: the dark winter in America, of reactionary cities, police harassment and death, overt discrimination, demeaning bureaucrats, obnoxious planners, and repressive elites. Emilio contained all of that history and more. The lessons in planning will forever be influenced by Emilio’s willingness to continue to struggle and train the next generation. We did not meet on friendly terms—I, a recent graduate school “professional” and non-Pasadenean, and Emilio, a working-class leader who was fearless is confronting racism and elitism. One Friday evening I decided it was time to “better understand each other.” I dropped by his house unexpectedly with a fifth of Johnny Walker Red, which facilitated a few hours of talking about the city, history, my role within the planning department, and how Villa Parke could be saved from gentrification. We established a lasting friendship after that evening. The lucha in defense of Villa Parke is discussed in this volume. Emilio and the collectiva were responsible for all final major political and tactical decisions, although,

given my expertise in planning, my influence was important. Ironically, in this period the knowledge gap favored the Chicana/o community since I specifically educated myself to critique environmental impact reports. The city of Pasadena did not have a chance. El Centro beat them on virtually every issue they contended during that period. Emilio gave me my placa, the poison pen, when he stated one afternoon, “Every time you write something that racist city (Pasadena) jumps!” He truly enjoyed a younger generation who could express his sense of empowerment on paper and force the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to continually sanction the city. When the developers walked away from the proposed “condos to save the barrio,” Emilio was ecstatic. So was I and the rest of the board. It was a tremendous sense of satisfaction. The power of the city was broken, and Chicanas/os were finally accepted into the negotiation arena, permanently. Of course, I was blacklisted. Conversely, for those racists in the planning department, I’m forever grateful since I was forced to reconceptualize my future as a minority environmental planner in Southern California. My life was enriched, mainly because I had a phenomenal mentor—Emilio. As I discovered in develeping this book and almost from the day I left Berkeley, the urban planning and policy arena is saturated with contradictions, racism, and immoral denial in relation to a federal mandate to revitalize deteriorating, blighted lower-income neighborhoods. The experience of Villa Parke was, and continues to be, replicated in virtually every city in the Southwest: Denver, Albuquerque, San Antonio, Phoenix, Tucson, Houston, San Jose, Sacramento, El Paso, San Diego, and the South Valle in Texas. This includes small and mid-sized cities where barrio activists are ignored by history, in spite of their tenacity and courage to struggle. Neither was my social situation nor history of struggle unique. Numerous other social actors who fought in the streets against a racist society returned in defense of barrio spatial relations. They fought against reactionary urban cartels intent on either destroying barrios (which occurred) or ignoring barrio crises related to uneven development by confiscating redistributive funding for elite civic center development (which continues). In a similar vein to my initial direct interaction with planning, other communities organized and utilized recently minted college graduates in battles to maintain the cultural vibrancy of everyday life in the barrios. By the mid- to late 1970s, the systemic racism in planning had, in conjunction with urban cartels, already failed the promise of the War on Poverty. The resistance movements were mainly reactions to regressive planning and urban policy, not enlightened barrio-based visions to enhance the quality of life in Chicana/o communities in the Southwest. This challenge to planning remains the critical crisis of the profession. It is not a notable past, nor does it offer a promising future. This project was far too complex for one writer in one city to complete. There are numerous individuals who contributed to this project, in major and minor measures. I know I will have missed a few individuals; my apologies. I want to acknowledge the critical theoretical and intellectual stimulation of two major urbanists, Mark Gottdiener and David Harvey. Gottdiener’s book The Social Production of Urban Space is a master work in relation to excavating the totality of urban theory and policy in one volume. David Harvey, whom I’ve never encountered, has developed a theoretical conceptualization of urbanism in which the working class has a central location and importance. It’s obvious why my professors at Berkeley refused to assign his writings

during the mid-1970s. Social Justice and the City was beyond their mercantile-oriented, ivory tower elitism. Intellectual curiosity is developed from a range of social directions. Art Flores, Sergio Hernandez, and Ralph “Rafas” Lopes of Con Safos magazine were influential in presenting radical visions of a new world to the East Los Angeles (East L.A.) youth movement. David and Emma Lechuga were central in leading the most significant social justice movement in Southern California in defense of the Westside barrio in San Bernardino. Emilio Cervera, Serafin Espinoza, Kim Resendez, Profilio Frausto, Ed Maya, and Nick Rodriguez collectively worked with me in Pasadena during an electric time in life. Carlos Rios and Rafael Cedillos offered an introduction, in the early 1970s, to Bay Area progressive Chicana/o politics that was qualitatively different from anything I had experienced. I would be remiss in not acknowledging the encouragement and support in developing this project from Tim Dagodag, chair of Urban Studies and Planning at Northridge. Tim has provided a sanctuary and a nurturing social environment for a relatively young writer transitioning into a new professional trajectory. Two of my other peers, Ayanna Yonemura and Ward Thomas, have been influential in supporting my projects. Juana Mora, Marta Lopez-Garza, Roberto Sifuentes, and Mary Pardo of Chicana/o Studies have been inspirational in relation to their community-oriented research. Two librarians, Karin Duran and Jackie Solis, provided continual attention to my demands for information. Jackie in particular has been a diamond in support of this project, proof once again of how important librarians are for all researchers. Kim Saunders of the Center for Southern California Studies is responsible for the urban mapping associated with this volume. Her contribution, for which I’m highly appreciative, was invaluable. Amalie Orme of the Center offered advice on research-oriented issues. Acting Dean Stella Theodoulou of the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences has been an important colleague, both now and prior to her transition into administration. Martin Saiz, Matt Cahn, and Tom HogenEsch of Political Science have been valued colleagues in relation to discussing urban policy and history. Paul Robinson, of geography, and his intern, Paul Kimmelman, provided demographic assistance. Lisa Duran, Maria Crispin, and Veronica Barela, Denver; David Arreola and Tim Tilton, Phoenix; Michael Orona, Albuquerque; and Steve Pease and Ruben Davila, San Antonio, all provided urban-oriented historical information on their respective cities. Tomas Bentiz and Christina Ochoa of Self Help Graphics in East L.A. offered their assistance in relation to the history of the Chicana/o art movement. Hugo and Mercedes Garcia offered an eclectic history of El Paso. The support of these individuals was collectively highly beneficial to the completion of the book. A special thanks to my companera, Antonia Darder, who has been a continual inspiration and challenge since the day I hired her at a child abuse and neglect agency in East L.A. One important lesson from that experience was what is normally considered a crisis pales in comparison to that tragic social issue. I also learned that social alienation and the lack of affordable housing are directly related to the nuclear family’s dysfunctional behavior. I had not anticipated learning that the abandonment of a legitimate, full-faith effort to revitalize lower-income barrios in the Southwest was

central to this social crisis. The damage of this profession’s failures continues to haunt the totality of urbanism to the current period. Antonia’s work centers this crisis in the classroom. This project is, in part, a critique of the consequences of that very classroom, in graduate schools across this society. David R.Diaz

PART I History of Chicana/o Residential Patterns

1 Introduction: The Structural Influence of Chicanas/os on Spatial Relations in the Cities of the Southwest El barrio—the central space, culture, conflict, and resistance of and within—is the foundation of Chicana/o urbanism throughout the United States. Both as a reality and a representation, it encompasses myriad interpretations. In terms of spatial relations, it is historically a zone of segregation and repression. Uneven development, inflated rents, low wage labor, lack of housing, and the worst abuses of urban renewal best characterize barrios in the arena of urban policy. Conversely, within the context of everyday life, el barrio is the reaffirmation of culture, a defense of space, an ethnically bounded sanctuary, and the spiritual zone of Chicana/o and Mexicana/o identity. It is a powerful, intense space that has defined the independence and resistance of a culture that predates Euro-American influences on city life and urban form. El barrio, then, relates to key themes in United States urbanism in many ways—in terms of physical locale, economic inequality, cultural solidarity, racial injustice, and political mobilization. In relation to the history of the Southwest, the development of el barrio was the second form of urbanism, following the settlement patterns of Pueblo nations. With regard to modern urbanism, first nations created the system of cities that are now the most prominent in the Southwest. In a period of virtually no attention from the national government in Mexico City, barrios were formed by relationships based on a mutualista social structure (Hernandez 1983). The community established collective forms of civic administration, construction, agriculture, social welfare, and local defense. Survival depended on the self-reliance and resources of the social network in barrios. In fact, prior to Euro-American migration, the barrio culture incorporated features of the modern welfare state: health and death insurance, community loan funds, collective labor in agriculture, infrastructure for storm runoff, and subsistence provision for families who suffered the loss of economically productive members (Hernandez 1983). Culturally, religion, history, and language shaped socialization patterns beginning in the late 1500s. During the mid- to late 1800s, these cultural forces became essential to the survival of Chicana/o Mexicana/o identity when this culture was confronted with the new EuroAmerican trinity of repression, political marginalization, and economic exploitation. Resistance to discrimination, in all of its forms, was interwoven into an oppositional logic that characterized social relations in this region following the invasion of northern Coahuila. Conflict with powerful state and economic forces stemmed initially from police vigilantism and bitter labor struggles (Barrera 1979). The confiscation of land titles and land rights following the Mexican-American War also generated conflict. Indeed, it permanently and dramatically restructured economic and political relations into the current era. Property, a key force for empowerment and self-determination, both

Barrio urbanism: chicanos, planning, and american cities

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collectively in the form of communal land grants or individual land titles, was systematically stolen from Chicana/o owners through the 1890s. This substantial loss of wealth and power was the foundation of marginalization, uneven development, and racism that characterized Chicana/o urbanism for more than a century. In the mid-1900s, resistance and politicization, while continuing to center on labor issues and land issues, expanded to include education, political access, and civil rights (Reisler 1976, 39). Throughout, el barrio served as the organizing platform to create networks of solidarity, support, and self-determination. Concurrently, Euro-Americans condescendingly viewed the culture of the barrio as seditious, threatening, and rebellious. These enclaves, in the perspective of racist America, were “untamed, revolutionary, conflictive and inferior,” typical terms used in the language of ethnic repression of internal minorities in the United States (Doob 1999). The logic of social repression requires a functional rationale to legitimate a civil society in which segregation (in reality ethnic cleansing) and brutality are normative social constructions. This racist Eurocentric vision of el barrio influenced the totality of urban public policy—streets, infrastructure, parks, housing conditions, politics, economics, the condition of labor, locational barriers, and, eventually, redistributive strategies. Later, during the Civil Rights era reforms, when the streets of America were the center of a broad civil and civic war to end the logic of American apartheid, the resistance of el barrio initiated a transition into a new arena of conflict and controversy, a battle against mainstream planning, urban renewal, and modern urban restructuring. It is this period and its aftermath that forms the main focus of this analysis and the critique of planning in relation to Chicana/o urbanism. The conflict between Chicanas/os and planning, in the broadest urban context, has its basis in Euro-America’s absolute control over spatial relations and public policy dating to the early 1900s. It was in that period that barrio underdevelopment began to produce numerous urban crises, the most prominent of which were unpaved streets, no infrastructure (for instance, sewer systems, water or gas lines), undermaintained urban amenities, lack of park facilities, lenient and/or unethical land use policy in relation to incompatible uses (for example, industry or landfills), and minimal sanctions against land speculators. Some of these problems persisted into the 1990s. Inattention to these problems led directly to lower property appreciation rates among minority land owners, constant urban deterioration, private sector manipulation of a limited housing supply, and weak commercial districts. The result was virtually permanent uneven development in the barrios of the Southwest. The relationship between planning and the real estate industry, the first true public/private sector partnership, began in the 1920s and 1930s and fostered residential segregation and blatant discrimination against Chicanas/ os in the housing market. While the real estate and banking industries were at the vanguard of establishing systemic residential apartheid (Denton and Massey 1993), planning assumed a structural role by ignoring the gross deterioration of the urban condition of minority communities. This period of systemic administrative neglect, based on ethnic and class privilege, “trained” the profession in relation to future policy initiatives oriented toward revitalization and sponsored by the federal government. El barrio would remain an arena of structural neglect, if not abandonment, by the local state for most of the twentieth century. One side effect has been an absolute lack of planning literature on the Chicana/o urban experience. Addressing the influence of Chicanas/os on urban spatial relations is essential because of

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

their significant impact on urban form, particularly in the Southwest. In many instances, they drove the demand for urban revitalization and policy reform to reverse the history of uneven development of the barrios. The two oldest urban forms of settlement in North America are pueblos of first nations and, subsequently, the formation of colonias. The evolution of cities in the Southwest is directly linked to Chicana/o urbanism from its earliest histories. In the twentieth century, barrios assumed a structural role in the production and reproduction of cities, in terms of both spatial and labor relations. With a few notable exceptions, in particular El Paso and San Antonio, these enclaves were numerically overwhelmed by Euro-American inmigration into the Southwest. But despite this, they have maintained an essential role in the evolution of the city. The shift in demographic characteristics during the past three decades has fundamentally changed urbanization patterns and reinvigorated the centrality of el barrio in the culture of the region. In fact, in a few major cities, especially Chicago and Kansas City, it is one of the most dynamic factors in the changing ethnic composition of this society. The changing class location of Chicanas/os has also had an important impact on Southwest urbanization patterns. The economic reforms of the Civil Rights movement have changed the locus of Chicana/o urbanism from a barrio-centered reality into a regionally situated influence. Challenges to restrictive housing policies, regressive banking practices, and affirmative action have transformed Chicana/o urban culture and society in the Southwest. Chicanas/os now reside in almost all zones of the city. No longer structurally “contained” in the barrio, Southwest Chicana/o urbanism has evolved into a three-tiered system: working-class barrios, working- and middle-class suburbs where Chicanas/os are a demographic majority, and suburbs where Chicanas/os are not a majority. The growth of cities is directly related to a massive demographic expansion in the past quarter century. The cities of the Southwest are collectively the fastest growth zones in the United States. Other than Florida, no region has experienced greater changes in urban form than the major cities in this region. Sprawl, inner city deterioration, urban renewal, low-wage labor, housing crises, transportation gridlock, and environmental problems were integral to this period of expansion. In numerous cities, Chicanas/os are either the largest or second largest ethnic group. (This ethnic transition is accelerating due mainly to the growth in numbers of native-born Chicanas/os and to immigration policies [or lack thereof] related to regional labor demands.) The future portends a continuation of this trend, and Chicana/o urbanism will increasingly characterize the region. The Civil Rights movement had another impact on urbanism. The emergence of Chicana/o social movements, some of which opposed traditional planning, ushered in a new period of contention and conflict over redistributive policy. In particular, they incorporated a critique of the failure of planning to address urban crises in barrios. These social movements addressed not simply the focus of urban policy but also engaged in struggles over representation, empowerment, and inclusion with regard to the urban redevelopment and land planning process. Opposition to irrational planning proposals and the acute lack of benefits from federal revitalization programs regulated by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) signaled a change in the political relationship between the local state and the barrio. This history, which remains

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undocumented, begs the question: when will planning place el barrio and its impact on Southwest urbanism at the center of urban policy?

The Critique of Planning Literature in Relation to Chicana/o Urbanism Historically, the planning profession has exhibited an eastern bias in relation to the focus of the “official” minority subject. Academia, including West coast universities, appeared to be “region locked” intellectually in terms of which ethnic community served as the universal subject. Latinas/os were afforded a second-tier status in relation to the documentation of urban policy and conflicts. The first major book on a Latina/o community, Patricia Cayo-Sexton’s pioneering project Spanish Harlem (1965), was an early model of how planning addressed Latinas/os and spatial relations. But in the aftermath of Sexton’s publication, the planning literature focused almost exclusively on Afro-Americans, and this one minority group served as the explanatory model for all minority urbanism. The exclusion of Chicanas/os in the Southwest—with intermittent exceptions—characterized planning literature into the late 1980s. The literature on the Southwest and its explosive expansion would have appeared to indicate a potentially new period of attention to Chicana/o urbanism and the central logic of the barrio, particularly in the literature. One book, Minorities in the Sunbelt (James et al. 1984), did so. While it did not specifically address the barrio in terms of urban policy and uneven development, this project did focus specifically on urbanization patterns of minorities in a few key Southwestern cities (Denver, Phoenix, and Albuquerque). However, most of the literature was devoid of a specific analysis of the impact of redevelopment, transportation, housing, economic policy, urban renewal, eminent domain, or a range of other conventional urban policy fields on Chicanas/os. No publication even remotely attempted to address the totality of Chicana/o urbanism. The literature does address uneven development, social justice, discrimination in urban policy, racism in planning, the affordability housing crisis, residential discrimination, immigration policy, economic restructuring, environmental justice, and other topics critical of planning. The problem is that Chicanas/os are rarely the focus in this planning literature. There is a definite intellectual hierarchy that has historically devalued Chicana/o urbanism. An exception is Nestor Rodriguez, who offered a productive analysis of Tejana/o urban crises in Houston and central Texas. He is one of the few leading voices focused on this arena of urbanism in planning. He links demographic transformations, urban politics, the decomposition of the barrio, the failure of urban policy, and uneven development. The studies that have addressed aspects of Chicana/o urban form and policy are either historical, social, cultural, political, or economic (mainly focusing on poverty and low wage labor) in forms. They lack a specificity to the urban that is normal in the planning literature. Mainstream literature within Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies addresses a range of social policy, including education, gangs, social welfare, public health, and political representation in which references to urban form or crises are a subplot in the analysis. Rudy Acuna’s editions of Occupied America documents a number of urban political struggles in conjunction with structural racism in public policy against Chicanas/os.

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

Ricardo Romo’s and George Sanchez’s historical analysis of East Los Angeles presents a demographic, economic, and urban assessment of the cultural transition of this zone into the second largest Chicana/o Mexicana/o zone in North America by 1940. This type of historical analysis characterizes a number of books that address the history of a particular community in which urban topics are addressed to varying degrees. However, these publications are oriented toward historical analysis, not urban planning. In the 1990s, three key books initiated a shift into Chicana/o urbanism. Victor Valle and Rudolfo Torres’ Latino Metropolis (2000) developed three sections on urban policy. This book analyzed two important urban issues: open space and redevelopment. It also contained sections that reinterpreted the culture of Mexican cuisine, the Los Angeles (L.A.) riots, and minority politics in Los Angeles (among other topics). Mike Davis’ Magical Urbanism (2000) is devoted to Latina/o urbanism. In typical fashion, Davis merges social commentary, urban culture, a smattering of demographics, immigration, the border, luchas (or struggles) of low-wage labor movements, and political representation. He tends to venture in and out of urban policy without a specific analysis of how planning should change. His eclectic political economy, while progressive, often fails to provide specific policy prescriptions, and instead offers only a tantalizing discontent with the present and projections of a disheartening Eurocentric future. Devon Pena’s academic project is on social justice and environmental movements in Chicana/o communities. In The Terror of the Machine (1997) and Chicano Culture, Ecology, Politics (1998, editor) Pena presents both the contradictions of planning and resistance in defense of barrio spatial relations. He is a leading voice in a wilderness within urban literature, in which Chicana/o urban, environmental, and planning issues have emerged at a glacial pace. Another publication, Quest for the Golden Circle (Gomez 2000), addressed regional urban expansion in mid-size cities in the four corners zone of the Southwest. Nora Hamilton and Norma Chinchilla expanded the Latina/ o urban literature with Seeking Community in a Global City (2001), which analyzes the significant impact of Los Angeles’ Central American community on urban policy and neighborhood transition. Collectively, these recent projects offer a framework for the future that is yet to be fully explored within planning. In relation to social policy and the urban, two other researchers, Joan Moore and Joe Feagin, have contributed to significantly enhancing a social and historical comprehension of Chicana/o urbanism. Moore’s early career focused on the intense gang culture of East Los Angeles, which was inherently an underclass. Her pioneering field projects, centered on gangs and socialization patterns, led directly to the social construction of the barrio’s everyday life. She focused on the urban context: inadequate housing, a lack of infrastructure, scant open space and recreational amenities, as well as other social crises, including poor education, public health problems, and constant police harassment. Since 1990, she has expanded her scope to incorporate the totality of the urban question in relation to social alienation and dysfunctional behavioral patterns—the intersection of planning and social policy. Joe Feagin, based in Texas, is one of the few prominent urbanists in this society who has consistently incorporated Chicanas/os into his analysis of the corporate dominance of urban systems; housing decomposition in minority communities; the high level of poverty in barrios; the relationship between labor control, structural deterioration, and the regional economy; and demographics of such communities. His theoretical perspective places Chicanas/os in the center of Southwest

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urbanization and economic relations. Although this ethnic group is often neither the main focus nor central theme of his productive research, it constitutes an essential urban reality within his worldview that has not been replicated by most urban literature centered on this region. What has been developed in the past decade does not constitute a substantive literature. A number of publications address some aspect of urban or planning policy in conjunction with politics, social welfare, public health, youth crime, and/or education. But the planning literature is devoid of adequate attention to, for instance, the structural underdevelopment of the barrio or the failure of affordable housing policy in barrios. In addition, there is a failure to document the initial history of urban social movements against the urban cartels of the 1970s. Works that address housing, urban renewal, open space, transportation, and economic development in barrios—whether using the term Chicana/o, Latina/o, or Mexican American—are missing in action. A review of the literature would seem to indicate that the nation’s second largest ethnic community has only limited relevance to urban public policy and city planning.

What Is Missing from Planning Literature on Los Angeles in Relation to Chicana/o Urbanism The history of sprawl, elite manipulation of land use policy, and the consequences of irrational planning decisions are important contributions of Los Angeles to planning policy. Los Angeles is important, if not due solely to the magnitude of sprawl and gross environmental destruction in Southern California. However, planning literature on this region was wholly deficient through the 1980s. Relatively few publications addressed Southern California urbanism. Mike Davis’ City of Quartz proved to be both a revelation and a critical catalyst in relation to the socio-political history of the region. The Rodney King rebellion further reenergized urban policy attention to Los Angeles, and publishing houses have exhibited a substantially higher interest in research related to the region. Ironically, the violence and urban upheaval impacted more Latina/o zones of the city than the predominately Afro-American areas of South Central L.A. The one area that advocates of expanding the focus of attention to this region have not sufficiently addressed is Chicana/o urbanism. While those who endorse an L.A. perspective address economic restructuring, immigrant labor, capital mobility, ethnic demographic trends, and the ramifications of suburban sprawl, they fail to make a sufficient assessment of how Chicanas/os have impacted urbanization. While they do note the striking demographic transformations and the significant influence of immigrant labor, this is insufficient in relation to the magnitude of the impact on the culture of the city/ region and urban spatial relations. With the largest Chicana/o portion of the city— East L.A.—in the center of the region, a virtual explosion of Chicana/o urbanism since the mid-1970s and the increased suburban expansion of minorities (a strong majority of which are middle class Chicanas/os), the students of this region have bypassed a major opportunity. Other problematic aspects of the school stem from redundancies. The main areas of analysis of this school—fragmented jurisdictions and autonomous, decentralized wedges—were first theorized by Fogelson’s The Fragmented Metropolis (1967) and

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

Gottdiener’s The Social Production of Urban Space (1985). Fogelson’s project was among the first major works that specifically addressed the convoluted, irrational structure of governmental jurisdictions in the region, and the policy crises and failures that had resulted. Those problems have only increased since then. Mark Gottdiener’s publication has been wholly undervalued and unappreciated by proponents of Los Angeles. He offered an explanatory model in relation to L.A. urbanism that has specific application to Chicana/o urbanism in Southern California. When addressing wedges, dispersed economic and political locations of power, different ethnic zones, urban cultural transitions, and political exclusion, along with a number of concurrent themes, the proponents of Los Angeles are fundamentally revisiting Gottdiener’s explorations of the “polynucleated pattern city of administrative decentralization (Gottdiener 1985, 61).” They echo his perspective on the structural logic of deconcentration, “…that the production of space has occurred in the main not because of economic processes alone, but, more specifically, because of a joint state-real estate sector articulation that forms the leading edge of spatial transformations” (Gottdiener 1985, 241). Gottdiener’s analysis of urban restructuring, especially in relation to the decline of lower income urban zones, offers an explanatory rationale for the underdevelopment and dispersal of barrios in this region. His articulations of Henri Lefebvre’s theory of space and the central construct of how actual users re-create space in their own (cultural) image legitimates the significance of barrio culture in the context of an ethnically bounded everyday life (one that Mike Davis essentially revisits in Magical Urbanism). It is within that central theme—the culture of the barrio, and its re-creation and restructuring of spatial relations throughout Southern California and, increasingly, throughout the Southwest—that Gottdiener’s approach to transitional periods of urbanization provides a theoretical explanation for Chicana/o urbanism. The proponents of Los Angeles as a mode address a wide range of conventional issues related to urban restructuring, global capital’s influence, corporate real estate speculation, high technology, consumerism, immigrant labor migration flows, regional economic transformations, new regional housing demands, commercial and industrial preferences, ethnic enclave markets and the informal economy, and sectoral discrimination and marginalization. The question is not this reality of Los Angeles—it is centered on whether these economic and social forces make Los Angeles unique or put it within the historic trajectory of other economically powerful city-states. In the United States, New York, Chicago, and San Francisco have had similar histories, with similar forces both in the past and present, that contain what is claimed as new by exponents of Los Angeles. For that matter the global cities of Europe and Asia also have strong urbanization patterning that is similar to Los Angeles’ history. Thus, what is termed “new” or “unique” is neither, but replicates the transitions and transformations of other powerful city-states in urban history since the industrial era impacted cities. This leads to the central question: what is unique about Los Angeles urbanism? One publication linked to the L.A. perspective purports to be “making the invisible visible,” yet incredibly the Chicana/o urban experience in the Southwest is not addressed. Apparently the claim that the book “counter(s) the mainstream narrative of rational…planning with alternative histories” serves only as a metaphor for the failure of this current project, in reifying the negation of the largest minority community in both the Southwest and, now, the nation.

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A leading advocate of the L.A. perspective, Michael Dear, has in a number of publications linked the Chicago School to this region in an attempt to elevate the theoretical importance of Southern California. This curious, and seemingly incestuous, interrelationship with one of the most (if not the most) criticized and debunked theoretical schools provides insight into what is missing—the mystery, so to speak, of the current approach to re-create an understanding of Los Angeles. The re-creation of that structural dilemma calls into question whether something “new” has been “achieved.” Prior to the mid-1990s, there did exist an L.A. perspective in planning literature, led by a number of writers who addressed a wide range of urban and public policy issues, including Fogelson (1967), Kling et al. (1991), Raphael Sonenshein, and Rudy Acuna. David Harvey and Mark Gottdiener collectively have explored a range of theoretical and spatial considerations that are central to an L.A. perspective. The issue, in this instance, is that what existed prior to this recent exploration should be acknowledged, not ignored. The most important “events” leading to a renewed attention to L.A. were the publication of Mike Davis’ City of Quartz and the Rodney King incident. In fact, this genre should be more suitably titled the Mike Davis school of Los Angeles, if credit due is credit acknowledged. The lingering question is, what is unique or different about Los Angeles within the context of urban form? A major contention of Dear’s is that in postmodern cities the logics of previous urbanisms have evaporated and that multiple forms of (ir)rationality have clamored to fill the vacuum (2001). In a sense, urbanism in Southern California supports a notion of a radical shift in the way in which cities are being created. The assumption is that L.A.’s expansion has made it fundamentally different from world cities that established themselves earlier, or from New York, London, Tokyo, or Paris in the modern version of major economic city-states. Immigration, which is linked to wage inequality, is a major component of a region’s economic structure. If this is a critical aspect, why has the L.A. perspective failed to address its impact on urban form, Chicana/o urbanism, the socio-cultural creation of the Chicana/o city, or the polynucleated character of barrio formation during the past quarter century? While Dear decries the tragedy of homelessness, which follows his field research agenda, the real crisis is the hundreds of thousands of working-class families in the midst of a housing crisis and paying exorbitant rents, not a few thousand desperate substance abusers (who do need social intervention, of course). In creating an intellectual Trojan horse, Dear, rather than presenting a critique of the Chicago School, seems mesmerized with developing an incestuous intellectual affair, with a dated, tired, debunked logic. Why the admiration? Does L.A. need a relationship with concentric circles to elevate itself into a theoretical stratosphere? How has either a relationship with 1920s Chicago or a claim of a fundamentally new urban form either accurately explained L.A. or provided planning with a different set of social, political, urban, or economic phenomena that has yet to appear in the literature? One aspect of Southern California that demands attention is the abject failure of the real estate, architectural design, and city planning industries to account for the environmental (and costly) disaster of building a city and region of this magnitude in a desert. The water supply inadequacies, air pollution, transportation crisis, open space

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

problems, trash generation, labor market irrationalities, mall culture, and corollary land use chaos are important. In developing a strident and enlightened critique of real estate and development practices in relation to environmentalism, and future social costs, the L.A. perspective has an opportunity to inform planning. The lack of such a critique provides some speculation in relation to research and its corporate sponsorship. If the L.A. perspective has a degree of legitimation, it derives from two unique aspects: Chicana/o urbanism and environmental degradation. This would imply a direct critique of the development industry from which most regional academic centers are financed, the very real estate industry that created the problem. In a sense, “walking gingerly around” the obvious—inner city decline related to suburban sprawl, which is directly linked to environmental crises—implicates corporate elites who control funding. The evasion of this interrelationship between urban form, regional history, environmental degradation and racism, and the planning failure of L.A., may be what is most notable about the current effort to elevate discourse on L.A. In its current iteration, these issues are not central. The other leading advocate for L.A., Ed Soja, has led an effort to intellectually defend the construction of the postmodern city. In addressing a range of urban contradictions and irrationalities, economic restructuring and the underclass, and how capital controls land, rents, and reproduction, he argues that the city has become postmodern. Ironically, the terrain that is addressed only serves to reaffirm the pioneering work of David Harvey and Mark Gottdiener. Harvey pioneered a substantial arena of urban analysis, contained in Soja’s work, in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Gottdiener, in developing the theoretical explanation for Southern California-style sprawl, the polynucleated urban form, prepared the field for the decentralization Soja has revisited. It is important to assess Soja’s work in relation to what was happening in the region when he wrote it. 1980s Los Angeles featured increasing levels of inequality, affordable housing crises, endemic discrimination against minorities, massive corruption (due to a costly subway project), and police repression. Thus, when Soja proclaimed that society had arrived at a “postmodern geography” in 1989 the critical question was, what had substantially changed in relation to urban form and social relations during the previous decade to justify his explanation of change? Had racism against Chicanas/os ended? Did the underground economy disappear or, rather, did wages improve? Had the LAPD internally reformed its practices? Was sprawl legislated out of existence to improve land use relationships and sustainable environmentalism? Was L.A.’s planning director fired? The historicity of Soja’s world view is informative in relation to both the L.A. perspective and perceived theoretical value in assuming a “post” planning period had arrived. Los Angeles toward the end of the 1990s offered an answer to the question of whether a “postmodern transformation” had in fact occurred. Inequality and poverty remained at high levels, the affordable housing crisis had worsened, barrios and ghettoes continued to deteriorate, sprawl continued unabated, the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) continued to practice extralegal violence, Asians were still enslaved in the garment industry, and environmental crises were exacerbated. This was the postmodern city of a leading exponent of the L.A. perspective in 2000. The question thus becomes, what is postmodern about these twenty-plus years of L.A.’s urban history? Los Angeles, like Athens and Rome, is not unique in relation to city form. It is unique, in similar fashion to all important, economically powerful city states in terms of scale and

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grandeur in relation to the countryside and underdeveloped societies. In relation to form and political economy, the city is not atypical. Minorities, Latinas/os in particular, remain politically marginalized. Although there have been political gains at the local level, the state’s triad of power—the two U.S. senate seats and the governor’s office—have not had a minority in over a century. Social movement activism remains the primary strategy for accessing power and changing policy. Workers continue to protest wage and workplace issues, mainly because they cannot afford to live in the city. Dear appears to have (re)developed an intellectual fix on the ancient Chicago School of Urban Sociology, apparently only for the purpose of (postmodernly) relying on a theory that was devalued decades ago. Soja, in his most recent publications, seems to have engaged in an exercise of rummaging through Lewis Mumford’s voluminous tables of contents for inspiration to create a pattern of esoteric terms that remain trapped in a normative Southern California term, sprawl. Exercises in postmodern labeling have not fundamentally changed a struggling civic center, halted regional sprawl into distant, desert suburbs, reformed the urban cartels’ stranglehold on redistributive funding, addressed the affordable housing crisis, or reflected anything remotely associated with enlightened planning in L.A. Whether an individual is flying, driving, riding a bus, or walking, the L.A. perspective implies that a qualitative—some claim a quantum—difference in urbanization has materialized in the late twentieth century. Most of the city’s key characteristics— freeways, single commuters, a public that hates downtown, low wage injustice, immigrant bashing, LAPD abuses, and urban barrio deterioration—have been around for some time and are not particularly unique. The two most notable transformations, Chicana/o urbanism and the looming environmental disaster, appear to be beyond the grasp of the post-Mike Davis assessment of Los Angeles. Imagine for a moment an accounting of L.A.’s true, long-term environmental problems, particularly sprawl and the effect of pollution on public health, economic policy, and racial politics. In addition, we should juxtapose the conflicts between socially stable neighborhoods and prisons, courts, and jail construction and a liveable wage and capital circulation in minority zones and gross exploitation of a labor force working weeks of fifty hours or more. Combined consideration of these issues should offer a potent framework for theorizing on the future of the modern city in the new millennium. It is what society will have to address politically, economically, and socially in the next generation. Harvey, Gottdiener, and Fogelson’s work from 1965 to 1985, along with the history of the Los Angeles Times written by Robert Gottlieb and Irene Wolt (1977), offer critical insights into a future that L.A. had arrived at by 1990. These are the intellectual predecessors of the L.A. perspective. It is an open question why adherents to the Dear and Soja interpretation of the urban have elected to shun this productive literature. The influence of Chicana/o urbanism is also what makes Los Angeles different from other cities, but the inattention to the issue has made it a critical conceptual problem. The transformation of spatial relations, especially in the cultural arena, has clearly occurred, as a decidedly minority populace transformed into the majority ethnic community during the past quarter century. The fact that Southern California is on a trajectory to becoming 50 percent Latina/o has dramatically impacted the culture of local communities, many of whose everyday life is becoming increasingly barrio-oriented. The evolution of the

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

Chicana/o city, the dispersal of this populace throughout the region (and state), and the dynamic expansion of the region related to demographic changes would appear to have been a key rationale for analysis of this region. Gottdiener’s concept of polynucleated development reflects the evolution of the spatial logic of barrios in Southern California. “Consequently, the present form of metropolitan expansion represents less the desires of its…residents…than the uncoordinated activities of…capital disguised by the ideology of growth. The outcomes of this development process are renegotiated by those who bear its costs. Thus the socio-spatial environment represents both the interests involved in the property sector and the materialized scars of the political renegotiation between the initial profit takers and the eventual users of settlement space, as the latter vainly battle to recreate some form of consociation within the hostile environment of unrelenting secondary circuit activity and its constant turnover of land” (Gottdiener 1985, 249–50). The culture of el barrio is at the center of re-creating a socio-cultural enclave within that hostile, repressive capital-state relationship structured to extract labor and rent. The geography of East L.A. was insufficient to address the housing demands in the post-Civil Rights period, when the size of the population rapidly expanded. El barrio has become a polynucleated system of working class, Chicana/o enclaves impacting the totality of Southern California. In addition, Chicana/o-majority working-class suburbs now characterize the second wave of demographic suburb transformations. A final aspect is the influx of this ethnic group into traditional “lily white” suburbia. These transitions in urbanization patterns should have been a fundamental focus within the study of Los Angeles. In terms of urban policy, Chicano/Latino urbanism is what is new about Los Angeles, and its examination will lead to an explanatory model for Southwest Chicana/o urbanism. The major cities of this region have experienced patterns of overconcentration within barrios, leading to migration into adjacent working-class suburbs and, in the current period, entrance into the suburban housing mainstream. The modern era of Chicana/o urbanism had its initiation in Los Angeles, a valuable policy history that, if not ignored, is definitely understated by the recent planning literature on this region. In addition, focused attention on the environmental disaster of sprawl, Southern California style, could have been the center of the critique of suburbia. This, linked with a structural relationship to the underdevelopment of barrios and Chicana/o working class suburbs, beyond an economic restructuring framework, would have benefited an academic project attempting to validate the overused term “New” in the late twentieth century.

Failed Suburbia and the Dialectics of New Urbanism What is being claimed as “new urbanism” is in reality “barrio urbanism” or “Chicana/o urbanism.” The attempt to return to the social function of the city has not fundamentally changed in barrios during the past century. The cultural logic of a communally oriented spatial arena that reflects the rich interrelationships and social networks within Chicana/o urbanism has intrinsic social value to planning and urban sociology. The fact that barrio urbanism is not undervalued or marginalized, but totally ignored by new urbanists is only the latest form of exclusionary Eurocentric urban visions. What purpose is served when

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yet another “new theory” fails miserably to acknowledge what already exists in colonias and barrios throughout the Southwest (Arreola 2002; Gamez 2002; Rojas 1999)? The answer is related to what new urbanists, especially architects and planners, want to deflect—the failure of suburbia, culturally, environmentally, and, increasingly, economically. As suburbia’s residents sit on gridlocked freeways, psychologically stressed out over the loss of family leisure time and frightened by housing costs, some urbanists are finally addressing the fundamental crisis of suburbia (Calthorpe and Fulton, 2001). Fundamentally, suburbanites have to be retrained to become ciudadinos. What new urbanism/ failed suburbia advocates is a reformulation of design and planning that “forces” regional citizens to remember that they are just that, citizens—and furthermore, that it is important to actually interact with one another on occasion. It is a perspective grounded on an acknowledgment that the concept of cuidadino has virtually disappeared due to sprawl and the failure to reverse a destructive, and environmentally unsustainable, urban pattern. In reflecting on the everyday life of el barrio, the central formulation of Chicana/o urbanism is the social—walking, communal relationships, sharing, active use of public space, taking time to talk, celebration of children, opening the home for food, play, and socialization. This is directly related to compact residential environments, pedestrianfocused consumption trips, active use of public transportation, accessible commercial zones, live work relationships, and active recycling (often related to economics). It is the form and function of the city, the intensive utilization of space. Chicana/o urbanism’s vibrancy is correlated to an eclectic reconstruction of space and the social functions of that space. Jardins, patios, and salons are the spatial zones that structure everyday life centered on an appreciation of social interaction. The culture of el barrio has historically functioned as the first point of political resistance and cultural defense. That cultural logic, in the current period, is historic urbanism, the celebration of the cuidadino in all of its cultural manifestations. In reality, what is claimed as “new” within new urbanism is in reality “old.” It recreates and reifies yet again a Eurocentric vision in which Chicana/o urbanism has no value. What is being proposed already exists. What should be learned is avoided due to a racist ideology that refuses a leadership role for minorities, even in this instance when Euro-Americans are copying an existing urban form of cultural relationships. Because what is being advocated—compact urban form, public transportation, pedestrian activity, economic sustainability, recycling, active use of urban spaces (public and private), the economic and environmental necessity to reject suburban sprawl, and a return of Touraine’s social actor—is, in reality, everyday barrio life. New urbanism also derives an elite demand that any reformulation of urban patterns mandates the creation of expensive, elite zones through the use of redevelopment and/or other state subsidies. Numerous new urbanist developments are in reality re-creating the class and ethnic exclusionary policies of a failed suburbia. Affordable housing for the working class is too advanced for a perspective that translates into an economic fear of ethnic minorities in the neighborhood. Sound familiar? It should. Without inclusionary home pricing, new urbanists are also repeating the cultural failure of suburbia, the reestablishment of a system of residential apartheid (Denton and Massey 1993) in the guise of an enlightened, “post” modern urbanism. There is nothing “postmodern” about ethnic and class exclusion, tactically, theoretically, or practically. Yet, when proponents of this

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

perspective fail to criticize new developments and transit centers as nothing more than another formulation of privileged economic development zones due to an acute lack and/or no affordable housing, they inherently support urban economic apartheid. This perspective, with its abject incapability to recognize and acknowledge the lessons and value to planning and public policy of barrio culture, reproduces an old logic— minorities have no or limited impact on urban theorizing or progressive restructuring of urban form and function. This perspective hides in high rise towers far from the vibrant social interaction that characterizes Chicana/o urbanism (especially proponents from California, whom one might assume should know better). The premise that expensive developments are essential to restructuring social relations—in effect a struggle to reverse the alienation of suburban culture—rationalizes that working-class communities will be taken care of in the future. Designers, planners, and architects argue for a tautological contract—hire us to create a new urban form since this perspective is the vanguard of the return of the cuidadino. But there is another obvious rationale toward devaluing Chicana/o urbanism: economic interests are negated if that future already exists and requires no new inquiry or, more appropriately, negates yet another sales pitch for redistributive funds for elites.

A Brief Note on Chicana/o Urbanism The early social production of Chicana/o urban spaces in the Southwest—dilapidated tenement housing, campos adjacent to agricultural zones, shanty towns near railroad yards or in communal rural communities, were accompanied by the socio-cultural forces of Chicanas/os, Tejanas/os, and Mexicanas/ os. Las Colonias y el barrios, segregated and marginalized zones, were essential to addressing (a term that seems inappropriate in relation to actual conditions) the housing requirements of a colonial labor force (Barrera 1979) that facilitated the economic expansion of the region. During an extended period of the twentieth century, this populace was a relatively small sector, with the exceptions of San Antonio, the most important Chicana/o city through the 1930s; El Paso; and eventually Los Angeles. The urban literature on this period is sparse. Most histories address migration, political repression, racist educational systems, economic exploitation, and culture. Urban housing, economic development, revitalization, infrastructure are only subplots of the effort to document the Chicana/o experience of that era. El barrio, conversely, does have a legacy of its structural character. It exists in corridos, oral histories, photographs, remembrances of youth, Spanish language fiction, and an occasional government report. Those spaces, precious cultural arenas of resistance confronted by a society structured on racism, subjugation, and discrimination, retain a vitality that planning and urban history has yet to comprehend. This ignorance, which persists in the current period (as the previous critique indicates), only serves to complicate policy and allow the continuance of directed mismanagement in resolving the urban crises of the barrio. What cannot be denied any longer is the central role that the barrio has assumed in the production and reproduction of space throughout the Southwest, key major metropolitan areas, and, increasingly, in rural areas, semirural areas, and cities throughout the nation. In essence, the planning literature needs to escape its ignorance and challenge itself to address this failure in urban policy.

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The history confronting planning and urban theory is of a major ethnic populace that has had a significant impact on urbanization patterns, as well as cultural and economic restructuring in the cities of the Southwest. Numerous zones of these cities are controlled socially, culturally, economically, and (increasingly) politically by Chicanas/os. They, in the current period, reflect the urban evolution of East Los Angeles from the nation’s largest barrio into a massive Chicana/o city. Denver, Phoenix, San Antonio, Albuquerque, Tucson, San Jose, Sacramento, El Paso, Houston, and Dallas-Fort Worth, along with other smaller regional cities, have substantial zones, immense barrios that function as internal colonies in which the users dominate spatial relations in all their manifestations. These cities have also experienced a multiethnic transition dating to the post-Civil Rights era, in which public policy reforms addressing systemic residential apartheid first entertained the dream of integration. Twenty years later, in the mid-1980s, regional demographic expansion and demands for housing opportunity characterized the region. This migration into former “lily white” zones was structured on an earlier period of Chicana/o working-class suburbs, which sat adjacent to barrios that could no longer meet the spatial demands of an increasing population. The planning discipline must also focus on urban social movements that confronted the powerful urban cartels whose main rationale was (and is) to commandeer federal revitalization programs in order to finance systemic corporate welfare for the real estate industry in civic centers and favored economic zones (Feagin 1998). Barrio activists struggled vigorously against a rational functional planning perspective based mainly on arrogance, classism, and racism. From 1960 to the mid-1980s, these leaders rose up in opposition to urban regimes that refused to address the urban crises of barrios, refused to negotiate at any level with Chicanas/os, refused to end repression, refused to transfer knowledge, and, to this day, refuses to acknowledge policy failure. The barrio social justice movements that engaged in oppositional struggles against the brutal destruction of barrios and an undemocratic planning elite throughout the Southwest are the central focus of this volume. The neglect of this history has marginalized the numerous and, occasionally, victorious challenges to a racist urban policy at the margins of our knowledge. The literature on environmental justice, centered in a relatively recent timeframe, is inadequate in comprehending barrio urban luchas and reform movements confronting planning and urban cartels throughout the region. These luchas provided a legacy of opposition and a social network of resistance and informed the more recent Chicana/o generations, who expanded on their vision. Beginning in the 1960s, the barrios have confronted and attempted to reform planning. Indeed, in Denver, Rudolfo Gonzales’s Crusade for Justice in the 1960s was established on two key issues—urban policy and civil rights. The underdevelopment of the barrios of the Southwest indicate that this project did not succeed. The urban cartel’s economic and political influence hindered structural reform of urban policy. Social actors mainly engaged in reactive strategies to defend barrios from total destruction or gentrification. The gains were limited, often in defense of specific zones, without a capability to transform urban policy into an proactive approach to barrio revitalization. The history is rich and compelling, but the planning literature has ignored it. The current policy focus has shifted. Now lower-income barrios compete with Chicana/o working-class suburbs for revitalization resources. The middle-class migration dating to the mid-1970s has further eroded the economy of the barrio. Urbanism, in its

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

totality, is shifting to reflect the historic expansion of the Chicana/o populace, centered mainly in the Southwest, and in other regions. But political power has not been reallocated in response to the population changes. This is a legacy of racist gerrymandering, lingering Euro-American resistance to minority political leadership, and the control of two political parties over candidate selection. However, the barrio urban crisis is now, at least partially, the direct responsibility of Chicana/o elected officials and staff within the state.

Overview of the Book The first section of the book, consisting of three chapters, is a history of the initial, economic, social, and physical factors involved in the social construction of el barrio. Chapter two focuses on the period between 1900 and 1950. It provides an analysis of early settlement patterns, addresses the impact of immigration from Mexico on Chicana/o urbanization, and the role of mining, agriculture, and railroad industries and labor, and provides a review of historical literature documenting barrio formation in cities. A grasp of the role of ranchos in the Southwest, the historical importance of the Rio Grande Valley, the Mexican Revolution, and the way that the first major wave of immigrants influenced urban patterns in the Southwest are critical to the understanding of barrio urban formation. San Antonio and El Paso were the major cities in this era with significant urban barrios. The chapter also includes an analysis of the early history of Los Angeles and the significant growth of Chicanas/os between 1920 and 1945. Chapter three documents the consolidation of Chicanas/os in cities between 1950 and 1975. In particular, it focuses on how population expansion in select major U.S. cities in the post-World War II era changed the cultural context of residential patterns and social networks. It was in this period of mass suburbanization that the character of Chicana/o urbanism was structured. This chapter explores the role of racism and residential locational patterns, real estate and banking industry practices, and the modern social construction of the barrio. In addition, it addresses major federal programs like the Bracero Program and the GI Bill’s effect on the housing market, initial home-ownership patterns, and employment patterns. The barrio as symbolic and cultural space, exemplified by the historic East L.A. barrio as a “state of mind,” is an influential aspect of Chicana/o urbanism. The initial period of suburban growth and the evolution of the first Chicana/o majority suburbs—a response to the demand for affordable, quality housing during this period—also coincides with the destruction of barrios by freeway construction and redevelopment policy. Barrios were also pushed out of strategic civic center locations through land banking and eminent domain. Chapter four addresses urbanization in the Southwest from 1975 to the present. The pent-up demand for quality, middle-class housing and the impact of reforms that addressed a history of racism in the real estate and banking industries led to substantial changes in the social and economic contours of the barrio. These reforms addressed the spatial limitations of the barrio and social issues, like affirmative action, that confronted the post-Chicano Power era generation. One result was middle-class flight from the

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barrio. Another residual impact was the establishment of Chicana/o majority workingclass suburbs during this period. The chapter focuses on locational patterns that will continue into the twenty-first century, the future geography of Chicana/o suburbs, and their relationship to suburbanzing rings in metropolitan areas. An urban profile of how Chicana/o urbanism has distinctly impacted cities of the Southwest is visually presented in a series of maps. Census data from 1970, 1980, and 2000 are utilized to map six cities—Albuquerque, Denver, Los Angeles, Phoenix, San Antonio, and San Jose—which are characteristic of urbanization patterns in the region. Census demographic data from 1980, 1990, and 2000 provide a profile of the significant demographic growth rate in relation to total population in each city. The city of Santa Ana, California, is also analyzed in relation to the rapid ethnic transformation of that suburb in Orange County. Part II addresses a range of major urban issues and how they impact the Chicana/o community. The conventional literature has failed to incorporate the Chicana/o urban experience into the analysis of urban systems and histories. This section initiates this overdue dialogue between Chicanas/os and planning. Chapter five addresses housing affordability, structural conditions, and the character of housing in barrios. It looks at how local governments have implemented federal housing programs and overseen banking industry practices. The demand for affordable housing is and was a prominent issue in barrios and lower-income neighborhoods throughout the United States. Access to quality housing has been a crisis in barrios throughout the past century. A majority of traditional barrios currently suffer from substantial deterioration, real estate speculation, a high percentage of renters, and underinvestment. While renters predominate barrio housing patterns, there are sectors of long-term home ownership. In some areas, an increase in home purchases has stabilized housing values, albeit at the lowest echelon of regional housing markets. Conversely and coinciding with a rise in income levels directly linked to affirmative action and access to college, there has been, since 1980, a bifurcation of housing demands due to an out-migration to suburban areas and an increasing renter class in traditional barrios and colonias. This migration had been stunted until the structural issues of racism and exclusion were fundamentally addressed in federal legislation during the 1960s. When regressive banking practices including redlining, racism in housing opportunity and access, and discriminatory employment policy were finally addressed, more housing became available. A direct result of social progress is that Southwestern metropolitan regions have seen a significant change in the ethnic composition of their suburbs, reflecting a major increase in Chicana/o middle-class housing demands. Chapter six focuses on economic development and the structural role of barrio businesses as a permanent characteristic of urban form. These businesses offered retail and services that were locally driven and often culturally specific. The internal logic of minority businesses through the 1970s was often a result of exclusionary social policies that discriminated against owners who dared to venture into Euro-American commercial districts only to confront vigilante or state-sanctioned intimidation. Social practices included beatings, arrest, and derisive treatment. Another barrier was the fact that EuroAmerican businesses were not bilingual, a factor that discouraged patronage by Chicanas/os.

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

The physical condition of the commercial zones often mirrored the aging and declining state of the broader barrio infrastructure. Cities generally ignored the need to improve basic infrastructure, and hence these commercial zones suffered through decades of neglect with regard to street reconstruction, water system maintenance, and sidewalk improvements. Significant changes in the formation of businesses occurring in the 1980s indicated a shift away from the traditional small business character of family-operated companies. That decade ushered in the emergence of a regionalization of an economic sector that had traditionally experienced limited success in expanding beyond the boundaries of barrios. A number of influences were instrumental—affirmative action, technical knowledge in business management, and new opportunities in a range of professions. Reforms related to redlining and the banking industry increased access to capital. Government contracting reforms also had a beneficial influence. Multiculturalism provided new opportunities to market Mexican products and made it easier for Chicana/o-operated businesses to be accepted. Chapter seven addresses the current crisis in open space, cultural programs, and recreational amenities. The density of residential environments makes park space a crucial issue in barrio spatial systems. A lack of adequate personal space, crowded streets, a large youth population, and lack of financial resources for higher-end leisure activities mean that public space for free activity is highly prized. Neighborhood commons serve as escapes valve from dense living arrangements and the daily intensity of labor in working-class communities. Open space is also the larger context of the community itself. With a strong pedestrian ethic, streets and front yards also form an essential arena for communal discourse and cultural sharing. Barrio residents, in a rejection of modernist haste, stop, talk, visit, delay, enjoy, and entertain one another in a warm, humanistic cultural environment. Loosely affiliated neighbors are willing to chance connectedness in open public spaces, sidewalks, their homes, commercial districts, or stores. This social sharing is magnified in parks and recreational areas. In neighborhoods cultural fiestas are organized within urban open space. En Diez y Seis de Septembre, Cinco De Mayo, Dia de la Maize y otra dias de celebre toda gente en la comunidad termino el evento en el parque. The park was the official anchor for weekend-long programs of regional food, performance, crafts, and art. Unfortunately, though, prior to the 1970s park policy did not factor in how Chicanas/os utilized parks. The analysis in chapter eight focuses on the historical relationship between redevelopment policy and barrios. It has produced few positive solutions to the reality of constant decline and uneven development throughout the Southwest. In fact, an analysis of the socio-economic conditions and built environment would lead one to question if any policy orientation had focused specifically on comprehensively addressing the urban crises within Chicana/o neighborhoods. The condition of barrios and colonias has remained remarkably unchanged for almost a forty-year period. This is not to imply that absolutely no public or private reinvestment has occurred in these communities, yet it must be acknowledged that scant beneficial change, social or economic, has resulted from redevelopment policy since the 1960s. What has happened is the continuation of an antagonistic relationship between civic leaders, planning officials, and the community; the manipulation of poverty to legitimate the transfer of redistributed tax funds from

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barrios into civic center development; the abandonment of affordable housing strategies; and the deterioration of commercial districts. This has left a legacy of administratively directed uneven development in which disinvestment has remained the most common urban policy characteristic. During the most influential period of redevelopment, from 1950 to the early 1970s, barrios absorbed the worst abuses of the practices associated with urban reconstruction. Numerous communities were destroyed, partially dismantled, and/or excluded from the benefits of redevelopment. In fact, the logic of redevelopment served to destabilize rather than reinvigorate the economy of the barrio. In conjunction with regressive transportation policy that targeted minority communities, redevelopment policy as practiced in Southwestern cities treated barrios as expendable areas in relation to regional economic development. This highly negative policy orientation was (and is) correlated with political repression and exclusion; stark Eurocentrism in the planning profession; racism in the banking, real estate, and construction industries; and the inability of federal monitors to ensure equity in the implementation of redevelopment policy. During the past twenty years community leaders have been mounting a “rearguard action” in a weak attempt to rectify the abuses associated with redevelopment. Progressive visions of reconstruction have had only a limited impact on barrios. While barrio communities have demanded an adequate regional affordable housing supply, a reversal of the structural decline of Chicana/o business districts, more participation in the policy process, and increased employment opportunities, actual redevelopment policies have never achieved their legislative mandate. Part III addresses the history of conflict between Chicanas/os, the planning profession, and the urban cartel. Numerous political controversies characterize the relationship between barrio leaders and civic elites who have traditionally treated minorities as politically weak, marginalized constituencies with limited or no impact on public policy. The history of vibrant barrio-oriented social movements in the 1970s and early 1980s, ignored by the planning literature, offers a different interpretation of Chicana/o activism in urban policy. Chapter nine links the history of confrontational politics with the evolution of barriobased social movements during the modern era of urban public policy, coinciding with the Civil Rights movement and the War on Poverty. The primary characteristic that defined relations between the planning profession and the Chicana/o community was an acute lack of political inclusion. In coalition with urban elites, planners solidified the dominance of local urban policy cartels that excluded minorities from meaningful decisionmaking roles on land use, redevelopment, and planning issues. During the early modern period (1955 to 1975) this exclusion resulted in numerous negative land uses in barrios and colonias. This also established an antagonistic relationship that continues to this day. The history of urban policy in barrios is a history of racism within the planning profession. Most planners take a condescending attitude toward minority communities. A primary objective was defending a legacy of discrimination and exclusion. Entire communities were viewed as invisible. The advocacy planning movement established the first challenge to rational technical planning. However, this nontraditional approach, in which planners directly engaged with local leadership in the planning process, met with resistance.

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

What emerged was the initial stage of Chicana/o resistance to regressive land use and redevelopment policy. This history, which commenced in the late 1960s, directly refutes the conventional “discovery by academics” of environmental racism in the late 1980s. The issues and struggles that formed the basis of this “discovery” were only the later stages of a vibrant history of opposition in the Southwest. This era of antagonistic relations was based on three factors—the lack of political inclusion, regressive revitalization proposals that did not benefit barrio residents, and the disparity in access to and the censorship of planning knowledge. The evolution of this resistance into the environmental justice movement has been poorly addressed by the planning profession. The irony is that, in spite of powerful political and economic obstacles, most barrio-based social movements achieved some victories during that era. Chapter 10 focuses on the politics of environmental justice and the history of regressive land use policy in barrios throughout the Southwest. This history is laced with racism, bad public policy, and economic exploitation, which has resulted in decades of neglect and forced numerous communities to reactively defend their neighborhood integrity. This is a dual negation. In lieu of developing and implementing policies oriented toward substantial improvement of the quality of life within colonia and barrio spatial relations, communities have been constantly forced into rearguard actions either to halt the furtherance of regressive urban planning projects and/or force local government to resolve urban crises. It is a history of wasted time, wasted money, and the withering away of the concept of community by policies that assume uneven development as a normative function of barrio spatial relations within the regional economy. During the 1970s and 1980s a number of bitter conflicts characterized social, political, and economic relations between Chicanas/os and the urban policy cartel. Activists opposed federally funded redistribution policies that bypassed declining lower-income neighborhoods in favor of the elites’ preferred central city zones. These urban luchas attempted to address why barrios remained underdeveloped despite the expenditure of hundreds of millions in federal revitalization funds. In addition, the role of planning and the process of public participation were complicated by a systemic abuse of minority communities, which ensured that federal edicts would not be fulfilled at the local level. Often lacking knowledge of federal urban policy, environmental laws, and basic planning practice, activists’ initial demands focused on political objectives. But minority environmentalists were ignored and devalued by mainstream planning and environmental organizations during this era. The perception of the profession was that environmentalism was a middle-class Euro-American consideration. Chapter eleven documents how the Chicana/o community’s role—symbolic and substantive—in California has had a major influence on urbanization and culture of the Southwest. The evolution of the historic East Los Angeles barrio, the largest concentration of Chicanas/os and Mexicanas/os outside of Mexico City, was and is an essential reality of a culture of difference in an urban context that magnifies virtually all facets of the urban crisis. Other cities in the Southwest, all of which also have substantial and expanding barrios, pale in comparison to the sheer magnitude of the geography of East L.A. The initial era of activist politics and early urban patterns emerged in South Texas prior to 1900, but by the 1920s East L.A. had become not only an important component of Los Angeles, but also of the nascent urbanization of barrios in the United States. Within the urban arena of the Southwest, Chicana/o urbanism in California,

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especially in the Southern sector of the state, has had a pronounced impact on the culture, economics, urbanization, and ethnic relations in the broader society. The demographic changes had not substantially altered voting patterns in urban areas. After three decades of churning, Chicanas/os’ political advances in the electoral arena were painfully modest. Barrios were often represented by Euro-American incumbents who were permanent fixtures. Their lack of political influence caused frustration, and activists had to continually go to the courts to challenge discriminatory redistricting plans. Thus, the political ascendancy of the community was blunted. Two dynamics had a significant impact on political empowerment—the adoption of term limits for state offices and the strident anti-immigrant attacks launched by former governor Pete Wilson. California’s politics became highly polarized, especially with regard to ethnicity. Governor Wilson viewed this strategy as a successful platform for his quest to become the Republican presidential candidate. He supported the reactionary Proposition 187, which denied benefits to undocumented aliens. This in turn transformed voting patterns in barrios. In addition, term limits forced incumbents out of office, ushering in an unprecedented era of change in the state legislature. The main beneficiaries were Chicana/o candidates for office. The pent-up demand for elected offices ushered in a new era of Chicana/o political power. This change in political tenure provided the opportunity that was envisioned two decades earlier when demographers projected that minorities in total would comprise a majority in the state. Part IV assesses how Chicanas/os in public office are transforming the public policy arena. The election of Chicanas/os in Southwestern cities has impacted urban form, sprawl, planning policy, and the socio-cultural evolution of space. This region, which remains the most dynamic one in the nation in terms of urban expansion, population growth, and cultural change, is forced to respond to demands by both working- and middle-class Chicana/o constituencies. Demographic transformation which has reconstructed social, political, and economic relations in the Southwest, is the central focus of chapter twelve. Urban expansion is now correlated to Chicana/o population increases, both in suburbs and barrios. The recent census confirms the bifurcation of minority housing options. Lower-income barrios in historic locations continue to provide an entry into urban areas for immigrant low-wage labor. The expansion of barrios is a response to global and regional economic demands. Middle-and upper-income Chicana/o households are following previous trends toward out-migration into suburban areas. These trends are a product of Civil Rights-era reforms that addressed housing and employment discrimination. Ending the apartheid system of residential segregation has changed the ethnic composition of suburban communities. Sprawl, the main urban form of Sunbelt cities since the 1950s, now incorporates a range of ethnic groups. Flight from the barrio has significantly impacted ethnic diversity in all metropolitan regions. Phoenix, Denver, San Antonio, Dallas-Fort Worth, Albuquerque, and Tucson have experienced an era of growth patterns that are being stimulated, in part, by an increase in the size of the minority middle class and the lack of quality housing in inner-city areas. Hence, urban policy has evolved into two basic constituencies, lower-income barrios (urban and working class) and economically stable suburban areas. The perception of a monolithic, low-income community is no longer accurate. In fact, in many major cities, some entire suburban zones have become predominately Chicana/o.

Introduction: the structural influence of chicanas/os on spatial relations in the cities of the southwest

Population trends indicate that in most cities of the Southwest, Chicanas/os will soon be a majority population, or at the very least compose the largest ethnic group. This demographic change has led to competing urban visions and demands. Transportation, land use, environment, and open space policy addressing the Chicano community will necessarily divide on class interests, and public officials will face a new set of demands. In effect, due to population trends and Civil Rights-era reforms, minorities are dividing interests along familiar class lines, ones that characterized an earlier period of suburbanurban conflicts. Los Angeles is one of a number of cities with a three-tiered urbanization pattern. The expansion of traditional barrios due to immigration and population growth was the cornerstone of historic urban settlement patterns. This was followed by the expansion of smaller barrios interspersed throughout the urban area. The third phase, occurring mainly in the past twenty years, has been the migration to suburban zones by middle-class Chicanas/os. This pattern should continue for the next two decades. Chapter thirteen analyzes the future of political coalitions and the question of land use policy in a new political environment in which Chicanas/os are a major force. The social transformation of urban patterns, the densification of barrios, and the evolution of multiethnic suburbs have political implications for planning policy. The constituency of metropolitan regions has changed dramatically within a generation, class interests have become increasingly polarized, and the political arena is being reconstructed through the ascendance of Latina/o officeholders. While political access alone is insufficient in transforming urban policy, the increase in political representation will place new demands on revitalization and redistribution strategy. Barrios, historically considered terminal zones of deterioration and underdevelopment, now have representatives who are from these communities. This relationship has aided the policy reform process, and communities are now enjoying tangible benefits from redevelopment programs. Political leaders, however, remain marginalized in relation to actual power in the political arena. Few major cities have a Chicana/o political majority in city government. Thus, to be effective, they need to engage in coalitions to change the orientation of revitalization and funding into barrios. Coalition politics will not necessarily substantially change current local policy initiatives, but it is a viable avenue to ensure that barrios derive a significantly higher level of funding than has been allocated historically. Coalitions are presently the only viable avenues to reform urban policy, but this still constitutes a transition from marginalized social movements into marginalized political power. Chapter fourteen addresses Chicanas/os and the urban challenges of the twenty-first century. In all major cities of the Southwest, and throughout middle America, Latinas/os are reconfiguring the socio-cultural meaning of urban life. Their influence has translated into political empowerment at the local and regional levels, and they are confronting urban policy in locations unaccustomed to such challenges. Whether Chicanos are located in the centers of political power or on the periphery, urban planning has been forced to respond to how urban form and policy impacts this constituency. The urban crises of barrios, Chicana/o middle-class decentralization, reinvestment strategies, and inclusionary programs centered on land use policy are now mainstream considerations in this society. The era of protest against the planning establishment, while not entirely dead, is transitioning into a new era in which the reins of power are not completely

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dominated by Euro-American (mainly male) elites. This shift in power relations, however, has not dramatically changed the issues that drive urban policy and redistributive strategies, but the evolution of the Chicana/o city is transforming how cities address these issues.

2 The Early History of Chicana/o Urban and Locational Patterns in the Southwest, 1880–1945 The Chicana/o community’s structural relationship to the regional economy was a major determinant of residential locational patterns in this era. During the early period of settlement, Chicanos resided in small pueblos and rural townships scattered throughout the Southwest, a legacy of the land grant era (Rosenbaum 1981; McWilliams 1968). Initially, communal relationships provided ample natural resources to everyone, offering an economically sustainable lifestyle. Settlement decisions were not narrowly based on private property, but rather on the social and economic welfare of the entire community (Rosenbaum 1981; Hernandez 1983). The regional economy transformed with the expansion of the national railroad system and an influx of capital investment, both of which influenced the locational preferences of low-wage labor. Immigration, mainly from Mexico, to meet regional labor market demands has been a major socio-demographic feature of the Southwest since the late 1800s. The other major settlement region was coastal California, a legacy of Spain’s empire building and the mission system established from Baja del Sur to Sonoma in Northern California. The growth of urban areas in the Southwest coincides with two major historical epochs—the termination of the Plains Wars with indigenous nations and the advent of the railroad era. Both had a significant impact on the regional economy and the demand for labor. Expanding the ranching and agriculture industries would dominate the regional economy for the next seventy-five years (Rosenbaum 1981). The influence of the railroads, in particular, generated a transformation in economic relations, land ownership, and labor management relations (McWilliams 1968). The introduction of railroads opened the West to venture capitalists and unprecedented investment, mainly in search of mineral deposits similar to what had been discovered in California and Nevada in the late 1840s and early 1850s. The flow of capital investment changed land values as well as political and economic relations. Prior to this period, families had the opportunity to homestead, remain on communal land grants, and/or settle in towns, which due to acute labor shortages offered a reasonable livable wage. In the new era speculative investments on massive tracts of land, often through fraudulent mechanisms (Acuna 1972; Rosenbaum 1981), negatively impacted rural communities and began an era of spiraling economic decline. Economic restructuring forced households from self-sufficient, sustainable lifestyles into the wage labor system, resulting in permanent economic marginalization for well over a century. This economic relationship was characterized as a “colonial labor system” in which Chicanas/os were situated in the lowest echelons of the labor market (Barrera 1979). This dramatic change in living standards drew people into towns and cities where employment opportunities still existed.

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California presents a different reality in relation to settlement and urban form. The state was based on two models of development derived from the Spanish nobility. Townships were based on the “Law of the Indies,” which mandated how new communities were to be planned and developed (Goodman 1999). The other model was the land grant system in which elites were awarded tracts of land in accordance with their status among the nobility. The “Law of the Indies” contained specific regulations on urban form—the designation of civic plazas were to be the centers of development, and the law also mandated the construction of a church, military barracks, and both housing and offices for civil administrators. The land adjacent to the plaza was zoned into relatively equal lots for colonists. In turn, these were surrounded by larger lots for elites and future land grants. This outermost zone was primarily utilized for ranching and farming. Although colonists experienced significant risk and difficulty in these isolated and desolate regions, they still had to pay for it. After a five-year period, in which the crown assumed that the land would be developed into productive agricultural plots necessary to sustain the town, colonists were required to repay the royals for the land on an annual basis. The system of mission settlements, in which the construction of a church compound was the first stage of urban form, followed the formula established by the Law of the Indies in the determination of future land use patterns in the surrounding community. Land grants provided a distinct and permanent economic advantage to elites willing to migrate to this newly developing region. The entire economic and political power structure was linked to land and was validated by royal decree. Through urban settlement patterns, elites dominated regional culture and the economy. Few major urban areas developed during this period. The main city was Monterey, California’s first capital. Thus, the initial urban design for California cities was established prior to statehood through the Spanish royalty’s officially sanctioned form of land tenure. In the early 1900s, the two main Chicana/o urban centers were El Paso and San Antonio. San Antonio was historically the largest urban barrio in the Southwest. The city’s expansion was related to railroads, manufacturing, and regional agriculture. El Paso, situated on the frontera, was the major point of entry for Mexicanas/os arriving to meet the burgeoning labor requirements of mining, railroads, agriculture, and manufacturing in the Southwest. Both cities have traditionally maintained a significantly higher percentage of Chicana/o populace than all other major cities in the region due to their proximity to Mexico and to predominant immigration patterns. Other cities also developed distinct barrios, including Santa Fe, Albuquerque, and Las Vegas in New Mexico, and Durango, Pueblo, and Denver in Colorado. Along the south Rio Grande Valle, Laredo, Mercedes, Brownsville, and Corpus Christi were the main urban barrios. Tucson and Phoenix in Arizona were regional transportation and banking centers for regional agriculture and the numerous mining company towns that dominated the economy during this period. Barrio formation was tied to segregation patterns, and housing and infrastructure within barrios were poor. In an era of dense urban form, barrios were on the immediate periphery of downtowns and manufacturing zones. Due to poor wages, home ownership patterns were low, and residential segregation was rigidly enforced. Housing was constructed with reusable materials in an eclectic fashion. Overcrowding and sanitation problems, initiated during the inception of Southwest barrio urbanization, persisted for decades. For instance, in the 1930s San Antonio’s barrios had

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among the highest rates of tuberculosis and infant mortality in the United States (Rosales 2000, 5). The Second Ward in Houston during the same period lacked running water, proper ventilation, inside toilets, baths, and electricity (Garcia 2000). A key difference between the Southwest and California was the evolution of a system of major urban centers in the Southwest, while Monterey, San Francisco, and Sacramento were the only cities of note in California. The latter two cities reemerged during the gold rush era, spurred by a phenomenal migration into the state. Most miners and “prospective miners” did not become rich, however—they became part of the state’s labor pool, filtering into different sectors, rural and urban (Bean 1968). What they encountered were communities that reflected the Law of the Indies in terms of a grid street system, a central plaza, a Catholic church, and a well-defined civic center. This wave of migration fundamentally restructured economic and spatial relations between Chicanas/os and Euro-Americans leading into the twentieth century. The Southwest at the turn of the century was in effect a highly segmented society in which privilege and power was vested in Euro-Americans practicing a policy of strident ethnic exclusion. Chicanas/os, Native Americans, and Afro-Americans suffered economic, social, and political repression and marginalization. The constant demand for labor in conjunction with venture capital pouring into the region was the major factor influencing urbanization. While agriculture and ranching were the main components of the regional economy, mining, manufacturing, and railroad expansion required urban locations for storage, commerce, and access to the national market system (Rosenbaum 1981; McWilliams 1968). The key labor resource was underemployed campesinos from Mexico (Barrera 1979; Acuna 1972; McWilliams 1968). Chicanas/os, a significant percentage of whom were initially small-land owners who could not compete with new company farms or who had lost land ownership, constituted the other source of the labor supply. One of the most significant transfers of economic power came in the form of land, and it was confiscated on a massive scale (Rosenbaum 1981; Acuna 1972) between 1870 and 1895. Thus, as the economy underwent a massive transformation and expansion, minorities were economically disenfranchised and barred from benefiting from increased land values. The expansion of railroads and manufacturing was the most important factor influencing the growth of cities. From this, the Southwest evolved into a regionally linked system of commercial and banking centers, linked by transportation systems. This established momentum for residential and commercial development, and the rapid growth of urban economies. These historic changes in the region impacted the totality of spatial relations and civil society. Colonias during the initial period of urbanism in the early twentieth century were generally located in ethnically segregated sections of towns and cities (Romo 1983; Camarillo 1993; Acosta and Winegarten 2003). Colonias were characterized by declining housing conditions, poor internal roads (in reality dirt streets), and very little or no infrastructure for water, sanitation, and flood control. Ethnic spatial separation was augmented by either natural barriers or features of the built environment—rivers, railroad tracks, and agricultural buffer zones (Rubel 1966). Chicanas/os also resided in small agricultural encampments near townships. They constituted a rentier class, with limited land ownership patterns through the mid-twentieth century (Barrera 1979; Romo 1983).

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Numerous colonias developed adjacent to local employment centers, railroad yards, manufacturing districts, and in agriculture zones on the urban fringe. These “livable spaces” ranged from substandard homes to tents and shanties constructed from a potpourri of local materials. The sordid conditions of these urban residential zones established the negative and racist characterizations of Chicanas/os in urban space. Locked into substandard, deteriorating conditions, Euro-Americans viewed the colonia as a repository of marginalized families with limited desire for self-improvement (Garcia 1975). Regressive ethnic stereotypes reinforced a racist ideology that posited Chicana/o culture as debased and therefore deserving of segregation. During the late 1910s and early 1920s, the increasing demand for industrial labor changed the urban character of the United States. Intensifying urbanization and commercial development gradually encapsuled barrios and colonias that had historically been located adjacent to the center of the city. Concurrently, residents were forced into other working-class districts. For example, one of Los Angeles’ earliest urban barrios was centered along Mateo and Seventh Streets, which is currently in the center of the heavy manufacturing zone east of the civic center. This demand for manufacturing space resulted in the eventual relocation of Chicana/o barrios in the Southwest (Sanchez 1993), which created new pressures for housing in other sections of cities. This also led to new conflicts with other distinct Euro-American ethnic groups. The barrio relocation produced the spatial reformation of urban barrios in more recent times. In this instance, the evolution of the most significant urban barrio in the United States, East Los Angeles (East L.A.), provides a good perspective on urban transition in the Southwest. The center of this community, then (and now) known as Boyle Heights, was a multicultural Euro-American community consisting mainly of ethnic groups from central and eastern Europe, similar to eastern cities of the late 1800s and early 1900s (Romo 1983). The early Chicana/o households that migrated east of the Los Angeles River, mainly those forced out of both Sonora Town (the present-day Chinatown) and the industrial center, arrived at an area known as Belvedere (Romo 1983; Sanchez 1993). Another barrio, Joyo Maravilla, was established east of this zone. This community was located east of Boyle Heights, a neighborhood that resisted Chicana/o entry during the early 1920s. However, the demand for improved housing opportunities, in conjunction with a gradual increase in earning power, led to increased migration into the area. Thus, the initial cultural transition of the East L.A. barrio followed a tradition of urban ethnic succession characteristic of other American cities. By the early 1930s, the influx of Chicanas/os had a significant impact on the cultural dynamics of Boyle Heights (Sanchez 1993; Acuna, 1972). The rapid economic expansion of Los Angeles through the 1940s and 1950s created increased “white flight” from the Eastside and coincidently opened housing opportunities in this emerging barrio. Barrio formation is an example of how working-class constituencies can recapture space in their own vision. It also demonstrates the essential role of spatial practices in defining places and the importance of symbolic representation irrespective of ownership patterns or attempts at social control (Lefebvre 1991b, 288). In the argument for sociocultural freedom over economic colonization, the barrio exemplifies that “a weakened but true vision of this truth is an urban reality for ‘users’ and not for capitalist speculators, builders and technicians” (Kofman and Lebas 1996, 167–8). Competing forces impacting

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the central city, in particular population growth and expansion of manufacturing, combined with housing demands to produce a cultural reconceptualization of barrios. Urbanization placed constant pressures, particularly economic and demographic expansion, on the capacities of Southwestern cities. Barrio space was constantly impacted, reduced in size by economic demands on space and convulsed by increased migration into the city without a corresponding increase in housing opportunities. Two typologies of barrios evolved during this period. Barrios in close proximity to civic centers, which were enveloped by rapid urbanization, experienced improvements in basic infrastructure associated with the conventional extension of urban systems. San Antonio, Denver, Phoenix, and El Paso are examples of this type of barrio-city relationship. Basic infrastructure—streets, sewers, water, and electricity—was generally available in these barrios. While the quality and maintenance suffered from the inequitable allocation of government resources, the provision of these services was necessary in relation to the economy of the city. Conversely, barrios located on the periphery of urban zones or in outlying semirural areas lacked most basic urban amenities (Fuller 1974; Meier and Ribera 1993; Rubel 1966). Many such barrios had dirt streets in internal residential areas well into the 1960s. Cities in the South Rio Grande Valle and other cities along the frontera are examples of this second type of barrio. Colonias in these areas had remedial septic systems, poor water delivery, haphazard electrical service, and informal trash collection systems. Flood control, street curbs, and connection with local sewer systems did not occur until well after the Depression and World War II. The acute lack of urban infrastructure was especially problematic in mid-sized and small cities in which the structural condition of the barrio was not deemed essential to the locality. This legacy of deficient infrastructure continued to characterize numerous colonias into the 1990s, especially in Texas (Ward 1999). Some barrios, even in major cities, have residential streets without curbs and sidewalks. This is a legacy of discrimination in public works policy that began during the initial era of urban growth in the Southwest. The importance of developing an analysis of this period is related to establishing the foundational logic of the social production of barrios and the reproduction of spatial relations during the past century. The myriad public policy controversies and contentious demands to address underdevelopment are directly linked to the early evolution of urban barrios. During this period society deemed the necessity for basic infrastructure for barrio residents as a “public policy externality.” Barrios experienced a dual negation from this lack of urban infrastructure, a constantly poor quality of life, and a virtual guarantee of a permanent undervaluation of land in relation to normative appreciation within regional real estate markets. Thus, those Chicana/o households that did achieve home ownership never saw any appreciation in the value of their property—a direct consequence of the disparity in infrastructure quality. And there was an acute lack of reinvestment in these areas. Barrio residents were at a constant economic disadvantage, a situation made worse by endemic real estate speculation, redlining, and systemic abuses by landlords in the barrio rental market. In conjunction with low wage injustice, racism in banking and real estate, and inadequate urban services, the underdevelopment of the barrio became a “normative feature” of the urban geography of Southwest cities.

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Characteristics of Early Urban Chicana/o Barrios in the Southwest Barrio poverty had an economic and a social function, particularly with regard to the lowest end of the housing market. In this instance, poverty was (and has remained) profitable for those who oversaw the lowest register of the regional housing market. The economy of barrios was based on two main factors—constant demands for a semi-skilled labor pool and management’s strategy to force a low wage regime on the labor market. The result was the maintenance of a reserve labor force, immigrant and native born in cities in the Southwest (Barrera 1979; Ruiz 1987; McWilliams 1968; Weber 1994). Through either economic expansion or recession, an oversupply of labor structurally reduced pressure on wage increases. As a reserve labor force, Chicanas/os were constantly manipulated either by market forces or management resisting wage demands (Barrera 1979). In conjunction with a stratified labor market based mainly on racism, the depressed wage structure hindered the community’s ability to obtain safe, quality housing. The generally lower annual income of barrio households placed significant economic barriers in relation to locational opportunities. Thus, the social function of urban spatial relations was dictated by the interrelationship between a stratified economic system and residential segregation (Romo 1983; Acuna 1972; Camarillo 1993). The wage structure virtually forced Chicanas/os into highly specified areas characterized by low land values. Without an adequate living wage and pressured by the spatial needs of a larger family size, many Chicanas/os could only find living space in zones characterized by lower quality housing. This structural economic logic continues to influence the production and reproduction of barrios and working class suburbs in the Southwest. Other important influences on the location of barrios were natural geography and major features of the built environment. Rivers, railroads, industrial zones, hills, or other urban characteristics were utilized to establish the spatial limits of barrios and to separate ethnic groups. The earliest type of barrios evolved from within the parameters set by features specific to a particular locality. One commonality of this type of locational segregation was that barrios were normally located on the periphery of a city. Barrios often organized along railroad lines, near rivers, adjacent to the intersection of agriculture and urban uses, or along bluffs. This systemic identification of an “allowable residential zone” was controlled by local elites. They had to acknowledge the housing requirements, however minimal, for low-wage labor, while reinforcing racist locational practices designed specifically to maintain strict segregation in Southwestern communities. Constrained by the wage structure and housing opportunity, the social production of barrio spatial relations was normatively defined as the “Mexican sector” of the community. This symbolically implied that Chicanas/os had a semblance of control over their spatial circumstance. Nothing could be farther from the truth. A key characteristic of barrios is overcrowded and substandard housing (Sanders 1997; Fuller 1974; Gonzalez 1993; Haslip-Viera 1996). Chicanas/os resided in older tenement districts, dilapidated housing, and/or small units constructed from salvaged materials. Families mainly resided in one- and two-room units. Most homes, either rented or owned, were usually designed with two bedrooms, and the existing housing stock did not meet the requirements of larger families. Different internal arrangements arose that provided a limited level of space for the nuclear family. Barrios also often lacked basic

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infrastructure (Ward 1999). Internal residential streets were generally unpaved, and due to flooding, regularly eroded housing foundations. Curbs and sidewalks were considered a luxury beyond the needs of barrio residents. Street paving only occurred when it made commercial sense to link barrios to the citywide street network. Barrio residents often had to jury-rig phone and electrical lines to access these systems, a dangerous and illegal method to obtain services readily available to other sectors of the city. In El Paso, the lack of sewer systems, irregular trash collection, and civic neglect resulted in high rates of tuberculosis and other communicable diseases in barrios (Marquez 1985, 56). The squalor and depravation of barrio residential districts created a sense of fear and alarm within the larger community—fear of disease and alarm that a lack of control would produce social movements demanding reforms. Most colonias would not obtain sewer mains, water systems, gas lines, or regular trash collection until the post-World War II period (and then only gradually). Civic elites considered barrios external urban zones, in which basic urban systems were not deemed essential to everyday life. Residents had no recourse to pressure local officials in an era of “total” political exclusion. Indeed, the political elites exacerbated the underdevelopment of barrios by supporting administrative discrimination and abuses in infrastructure policy. Urbanization during the first five decades of the 1900s set the tone for the relationship between barrios and the rest of the city. Urban growth encircled numerous colonias that were originally located on the edge of the community. At the same time, constant immigration and demographic trends gradually increased the Chicana/o population in the Southwest (Martinez 2001). The extension of urban infrastructure, in particular street car systems and the regional transportation networks, restructured the relationship between the civic center and newly developed suburbs (Jackson 1985; Fishman 1987). This transition in locational preference from city to suburb and the focus of the real estate industry on suburban growth were instrumental in the increased disinvestment in the inner city. Thus, as segregated barrios became incorporated into the urban fabric, population growth put renewed pressure on the limitations of barrio spatial capacity, leading to the economic decomposition of residential and commercial zones. This placed these communities at a distinct socio-political disadvantage in the public policy arena. The extension of urban boundaries that facilitated the suburban preferences of the real estate and banking industries shifted public policy from a focus on infrastructure needs of the urban core toward allocating resources to suburbs (Jackson 1985; Fishman 1987). Consequently, urban barrios, located adjacent to the centers of mid-sized and major cities, experienced a substantial decrease in both private and public sector reinvestment. The deterioration of the inner city accelerated during the Great Depression—due to the economic collapse—and later in World War II, when the state directed available resources to the war effort. In addition, changes in local land use policies effectively destroyed or substantially restructured early urban barrios. The location of railroad stations, major regional highways, the expansion of industrial sectors, and the redefinition of civic center commercial districts all impacted negatively on the spatial contours of barrios. This type of de facto urban renewal forced Chicana/o households into adjacent aging residential zones that lacked an adequate supply of affordable housing and/or infrastructure. This further exacerbated the socio-economic crisis of barrios.

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The housing and commercial zones within barrios during this era exhibited signs of serious deterioration. The housing stock was generally the oldest in the city, impacted by decades of neglect and limited reinvestment. Also, early homes were typically designed with only two bedrooms (Bauman et al. 2000). Older homes of elites who had transitioned into new suburbs were either rented to multiple families and/or reconstructed into apartments. The early era of zoning policies that were designed to encourage future increased densities (Weiss 1987) allowed real estate speculators to construct multi-unit projects within residential zones that were initially dominated by single-family homes. Thus, barrio streetscapes contained a potpourri of housing types and scale. Bungalow units, older homes reconstructed into apartments, and attached units coexisted with the original single-family homes built in a particular subdivision. This structural densification occurred in response to the low vacancy rates and severe overcrowding, inherent within the racist “captured housing market” that have historically characterized barrios. Local transportation corridors that intersected barrios were an important factor in the location of barrio commercial districts. Euro-Americans typically owned the property. They were earlier proprietors who had relocated and leased to Chicana/o businesses. Thus, public pressure to maintain major streets emanated from Euro-Americans with a vested interest in the quality of their condition. However, the condition of internal residential streets and alleys varied significantly from city to city. Since urban barrios evolved during the initial era of urbanization, the condition of streets in close proximity to the civic center or in early suburbs was not substandard. This was due to the fact that public policy makers had responded to address the economic demands on urban transportation systems. But there were differences in relation to the extent of paving, long term maintenance, and the general condition of these systems. Barrios in small and midsized cities suffered most from poor quality streets. The provision of basic infrastructure in urban barrios, including sewers, water mains, gas lines, and electricity, were important components of the city policy. Especially in California, where the state legislature passed the first subdivision laws regulating both professional surveys and infrastructure requirements, most early suburbs contained these mandatory urban systems. There are differences in relation to region. San Antonio’s Chicana/o barrios did not have conventional storm drain systems until the 1970s. Urban barrios in other cities, such as Denver, El Paso, Phoenix, Tucson, Houston, and Albuquerque, generally lacked basic infrastructure services through the 1940s. Economically important cities tended to address transportation and communications. Conversely, small and mid-sized cities in the Southwest practiced selective discrimination in relation to investment in infrastructure for barrios. There, residents’ demands were ignored for decades. Cities instead focused on newly developing areas, including street car suburbs and other outer ring zones controlled by the real estate industry. Another problematic issue by the end of this initial period of urban barrio formation was an acute lack of infrastructure maintenance. Since elites assumed that barrios did not require an adequate level of infrastructure, the reconstruction of streets and the expense of building these systems was a low priority in relation to other areas. Erosion, poor quality construction, constant repairs, and lack of improvements created systemic infrastructural problems. By the 1940s, depressed urban zones that actually had

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infrastructure saw it deteriorate due to lack of reinvestment and a declining tax base (Hill 1984; Frieden and Kaplan 1975). Urban barrios, with limited political influence, had no ability to effectively lobby to force cities to address this crisis. Conversely, urban transportation tended to be affordable and accessible. Regions dependent on low-wage workers recognized the value of public transportation that linked employment centers to residential zones. While streetcar owners often operated at cost or at a modest loss, ridership expanded significantly from 1910 through the 1940s (Jackson 1999). The main goal was to link urban streetcar routes with new residential projects, which were also owned by rail line operators (Jackson 1999). Low-wage labor was an important component of ridership that allowed streetcar companies to operate at cost. Urban rail systems were particularly prominent in California’s major cities and served to address the transportation demands of low-wage labor. This was a key factor in the Chicano migration into East L.A. (Romo 1983). Another factor was the location of major employment centers within the civic area. Commercial districts were characterized by small businesses, Spanish language service, and retail outlets geared toward the ethnically distinct character of the barrio. A majority leased commercial space, since land was controlled by outside elites. Some Chicana/o businesses operated in homes in the middle of residential zones, due to high commercial rents, little capital, and few opportunities in the immediate vicinity. Small tiendas in internal, residential streets were an important urban legacy of this era. Another factor was that Euro-American businesses did not offer Mexican products and specialty foods. These businesses also resisted providing services in Spanish, which alienated barrio consumers. Those that did hire local, bilingual staff developed a reasonable patronage within the barrio economy. Chicana/o businesses gradually entered into a range of service and retail sectors in direct competition with Euro-American businesses, tailors, laundry, personal care, restaurants, auto maintenance, residential construction, clothing, and food markets. In all cities, segregation was a normative feature of barrio spatial formation through the 1950s. Early federal housing policy in the 1930s, intended to clear slums and provide quality housing, also contained sinister racist provisions. In fact, the historic 1934 Housing Act (Wright 1981) reified residential segregation. This legislation, which pioneered subdivision development as a precondition for federal mortgage guarantees, was designed to revive the morbid real estate industry during the depths of the Depression (Wright 1981). This act established the Federal Housing Administration, which issued an underwriting manual that specifically used ethnicity as a basis to reject federally insured home loans. This action mandated racism in real estate transactions with a provision that covenants that banned minority home ownership (Meyer 2000, 53) would still be able to receive federally guaranteed mortgages. In this instance, government-sanctioned racism directly endorsed ethnic segregation in newly urbanizing areas of cities. While it is highly doubtful that the strident racism that existed within the real estate industry required government sanctions, this provision served to reenforce the limitations on Chicana/o geography within the city. The only exceptions to this regime of ethnic exclusion occurred in neighborhoods adjacent to the boundaries of barrios. Population growth, constant migration, and real estate speculation interacted to foster a gradual process of community change. This ethnic

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transition, however, was an inadequate response to the housing needs of barrio residents and did not substantially increase quality housing opportunities.

The Formation of Barrios in Selected Cities in the Southwest Where barrios formed depended on a range of determinants—historical factors, the degree of cultural and ethnic segregation, economics of urban land, specific features of the natural or built environment, and the dynamism of the regional economy. The system of cities in the Southwest also reflects the initial settlement preferences of Native American societies prior to European arrival (Butzer 1999) as well as the subsequent immigration of Euro-Americans into the developing region. The formation of settlements was strongly influenced by Spain’s control of indigenous societies, resources, and land. By the end of the Mexican-American War in 1850, the Southwest territories ceded to the United States had already developed a regional system that continued to expand over the next century. San Antonio, Santa Fe, Phoenix, Monterey, Laredo, El Paso, Durango, Pueblo, Nogales, and Las Vegas (New Mexico) had been important regional urban settlements and/or cities since the early 1800s. The system of missions in California formed the foundation for future urbanization along the Pacific coast. By the late 1800s, the parameters of the social construction of Chicana/o urban barrios had been set by the specific cultural, political, and economic histories of cities in the region. Urban expansion was an important factor in the overall development of the region. However, cities in the Southwest exhibited significantly lower growth rates than Eastern and Midwest cities at the turn of the century. The main exception was San Francisco, a city that was the financial and trade center of California’s gold and agricultural economy. Barrios formed for two primary reasons: the housing requirements of Chicanas/os and a massive increase in immigration. The key issue confronting virtually all barrios was the lack of an adequate supply of housing to meet the labor demands of economic expansion. This analysis of selected early urban barrios is indicative of a consistent pattern of underdevelopment, strained spatial capacity, and urban deterioration. These factors led to the social construction of barrio spatial relations and cultural solidarity that influenced urban systems through most of the century. El Paso, El Segunda Barrio El Segunda Barrio is one of the most influential and historic zones of Chicano/a urbanism in the Southwest. This area is directly south of the civic center and extends to the border. Initially, this barrio incorporated space on both sides of the Rio Bravo (Marquez 1985). After the Mexican-American War, El Paso Del Norte was fractured into two cities, Juarez and El Paso. Along with the South Valle, this city functioned as a critical point of entry for low-wage laborers migrating north. In addition, in the early 1900s civic elites aggressively expanded manufacturing industries by utilizing an important strategic advantage: very low-wage labor. In fact, during that era they established a ceiling on regional hourly wages, across economic sectors, to ensure a competitive advantage for any business willing to relocate to El Paso (Garcia 1975). Another factor in the labor market was the participation of Chicanas in three job categories: laundresses, domestics,

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and store clerks (Garcia 1975). The barrio functioned in relation to local and regional labor markets. The extremely low wages had a definite impact, as the structural conditions of this barrio were in a deleterious state almost from the establishment of modern El Paso. The barrio lacked paved streets, functional infrastructure, potable water, sewer mains, and regular trash collection. Overcrowded, substandard housing conditions resulted in high disease rates and infant mortality levels. Some women in the labor force had to make a daily decision: whether to prepare a lunch for their ten- to twelve-hour shifts or give the food to their children (Garcia 1975). This was a direct result of a rigid wage ceiling enforced by elites. Malnutrition and poor housing manifested the extreme poverty and underdevelopment that characterized El Segunda Barrio’s urban condition. The barrio has remained a highly impoverished zone since the city was established. In the 1970s overcrowding and substandard conditions still characterized the housing situation, and the city failed to revitalize it or to focus revitalization programs to address the barrio’s urban crisis. Although lack of investment, poor urban amenities, constant migration of low-wage labor, and publicly sanctioned discrimination regarding resource allocation (Marquez 1985) resulted in neighborhood social decomposition, the zone maintains its legacy as one of the most important barrios in the Southwest. In relation to regional labor market demands, El Segunda Barrio is one of the most critical centers of labor supply, a legacy now beginning its third century. San Antonio, West Side The West Side barrio was established directly adjacent to the civic center. The city’s early formation occurred in two plazas that served as focal economic, civic, and cultural arenas (Arreola 2002). The city was historically the major economic and administrative city in the region during the three regimes of control prior to 1850: Spain, Mexico, and Texas. San Pedro Creek was a natural boundary immediately to the west of these plazas and demarcated the barrios. The barrio developed a number of pedestrian-oriented neighborhood plazas. The area also featured a number of commercial uses: meat packing, produce markets, stockyards, and the railroad were all either within or adjacent to the barrio. Most of these plazas and marketplaces were oriented to the barrio economy. This area exhibited the economically most significant level of Chicana/o ownership patterns in the Southwest during the first half of the twentietht century, and La Prensa was the most widely circulated Spanish language newspaper in the Southwest during that period. San Antonio was considered the capital of South Texas (Arreola 2002). By the 1880s, San Pedro Creek formed the boundary that segregated the West Side from the city. San Antonio was the major destination for Mexican immigrants and rural Tejanas/os moving from the frontera. During the early twentieth century, the city had the highest percentage of Chicanas/os of any major city in the Southwest, and it maintained its status in the hierarchy of Southwestern cities throughout the century. The barrio’s labor force was a major factor in maintaining the city’s dominance over the regional economy in banking, manufacturing, commerce, and culture. The barrio economy was itself a significant center of commerce, opportunity, and business formation for minority entrepreneurs.

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Despite all this, the area has been the most impoverished zone of the city for a century. During the earliest period of barrio formation the housing consisted of branches, adobe, dirt floors, and thatched roofs. After 1920, typical housing changed to modest one- or two-bedroom wood frame homes. However, most streets were unpaved, and the city did not extend infrastructure into residential zones. Thus, land values stayed relatively low. Not surprisingly, the city’s first public housing development was located on the West Side, and in the 1960s two freeway routes were constructed through the barrio. The area has been the most impoverished zone of the city for a century. In the 1970s, Communities Organized for Public Service (COPS) formed to confront the city on the acute lack of infrastructure and public services for the barrio. Thus, even into the late twentieth century, in the city that was the most significant in terms of economic and social solidarity for Chicanas/os in the region, Euro-American leaders continued to neglect the provision of basic urban amenities to the West Side, which historically had been the most significant barrio in the broader region. Houston, Magnolia Houston typifies the modern expansion of Sunbelt cities in the later years of the twentieth century (Bernard and Rice 1983). Two important factors led to the rapid urban expansion of the city: civic boosterism and oil. The city lobbied successfully for the construction of a major harbor and channel to the Gulf of Mexico, which transformed the urban economy. Civic elites also were able to control labor costs, provide low-cost housing, and successfully fight union organizing through ordinances (Kaplan 1983). This is the only major city in America without zoning or planning regulations. Partly as a consequence, over 75 percent of the city was constructed between 1945 and 1980 (Kaplan 1983). Conversely, the city has had a significant Tejana/o populace throughout its history. The two main barrios, El Segunda Barrio and Magnolia, offer a portrait of the socio-economic conditions that have existed in the city (Garcia 2000; Rodriguez 1993). The first settlement house in the city to address urban poverty (Garcia 2000) was located in El Segunda Barrio, directly southwest of the civic center. In the 1920s and 1930s the area transitioned into a major center for Chicanas/os in the city. The area had the oldest housing stock and lacked basic urban amenities. Jacales of tin, sheet iron, and barrel stays were common materials used for home construction (Garcia 2000). Sidewalks were nonexistent, streets were rutted and full of garbage, and local rail lines were hazardous. Petitions by barrio leaders and settlement house advocates for urban reforms were generally ignored by civic elites. When the settlement movement opened a home in the Magnolia Park area, local Euro-American residents (early so-called NIMBYs, e.g., “not in my backyard”) vociferously opposed the center and forced the closure of the site (Garcia 2000). During the Depression, Chicanas/os were barred from New Deal programs, which further exacerbated the social crisis of the barrio. Eventually, a significant increase in migration patterns beginning in the 1930s and 1940s facilitated the transition of Magnolia into a major barrio. Ship channel-related employment was an important factor leading to this growth. In the current period, Magnolia reflects the economic and social relationships between barrios and the regional economy (Rodriguez 1993). The barrio is a center for regional and transborder in-migration of the low-wage labor required by Houston’s economy.

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Since the early 1980s, another demographic influence has been the migration of Central Americans into the Southwest, a distinct difference from the era’s initial migration pattern, which focused on the Los Angeles region. A significant percentage of Magnolia’s populace is now Central American (Rodriguez 1993). Throughout the century, Chicano/a economic mobility has been stagnant despite three periods of economic expansion: one based on shipping, one on oil, and one in the 1970s that stemmed from a broader transformation of Houston’s economy. In the 1970s, Chicanas/os had “maintained an inferior labor market position” (Rodriguez 1993, 110), which is characteristic of the history of regional labor and economic relations (Barrera 1979). Since that period, many Chicanas/os have transitioned into middle-class suburbs and newer barrios in the western sector of the city. However, Magnolia retains its historical position as one of the main barrios in the city, characterized by lower-cost, overcrowded housing conditions. The economic recessions of the 1980s also placed inordinate demands on government services and social service agencies. Thus, uneven development and structural deterioration remained problematic in both barrios throughout the 1900s. San Francisco, Mission District Since Monterey was the state capital and major city of Alta California, San Francisco’s early urban history was that of an undervalued port city utilized mainly to export resources to Spain and Mexico. The discovery of gold in 1848 and the historical anomaly of the gold rush era transformed the city’s ascendance into economic and political power in relation to Monterey and Sacramento, the eventual state capital. The barrio was adjacent to Mission Dolores, which is directly south of the current civic center. This sector of the city, a short distance from the bay, was one of the initial zones of workingclass housing linking labor to the harbor. The locational preference of elites and merchants was along Market Street and areas leading to the northern zone of the bay. By the early 1900s, the Mission District, especially after the great fire of 1906, was the working class district of the city. Mission Street is the major thoroughfare in this zone. The area is in close proximity to manufacturing, warehousing, and wharves. Initially multi-ethnic in character, the composition of this area changed with the out-migration of Euro-Americans into new suburbs developing west of the civic center. By the 1920s and 1930s, a hybrid of Spanish and Chicana/o cultural influences dominated the Mission District. The concentration of Chicanas/os changed the economic and social milieu of the zone as well. By mid-century, the Mission District was recognized as the city’s barrio. In conjunction with exclusionary housing practices, the generally older housing stock has declined precipitously during the past twenty years. The social formation of the Mission District was reinforced by its location south of Market Street and east of the urban expansion that, by the 1920s, changed the urban character of San Francisco. The newly developed suburbs to the west were devoid of Chicanas/os in the formative era of urban transition. The Mission District barrio was re-created from a multi-ethnic zone into an enclave that defined the Latina/o experience in this city.

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The Historical Significance of the Early Evolution of East Los Angeles During the late 1890s and early 1900s, migration from Mexico to the United States tended to remain situated along border states in relative proximity to northern provinces. In California, Chicanas/os constituted a significant percentage of the state’s populace, but a number of other states had substantially higher percentages of Chicana/o residents. With the constant expansion of California’s agricultural industry, the migration patterns gradually shifted to the west. The early growth of Los Angeles generated a significant level of lowskill employment in agriculture, railroads, manufacturing, and services. The city’s two main Chicana/o residential zones, Sonora Town and along the west bank of the Los Angeles River, were adjacent to the civic center. The civic boosterism that was central to Los Angeles’ rapid urban expansion (Gottlieb and Wolt 1977; Starr 1990) also influenced the migration of Mexicanas/os into the region. Another factor was political. Ricardo and Enrique Magon, along with other leaders of the Partido Liberal Mexicano (PLM), relocated to Los Angeles in 1907, in an attempt to evade the constant harassment and legal conflicts that had followed them from Mexico, South Texas, then San Antonio and St. Louis. The PLM initially supported a political solution to the repressive Porfilio Diaz regime. Disillusioned with jailings, beatings, and assassinations of opposition leaders and labor activists, the Magons voluntarily migrated to the United States. Initially, they felt comfortable that the Bill of Rights and other democratic influences would allow them to maneuver freely in U.S. society while pursuing their dream of a democratic transformation of Mexico (Quinones 1973). This naive belief in American pluralism was shattered relatively soon as they encountered constant racism, repression, and discrimination in the Southwest. The PLM leadership shifted some of its attention to the socio-political conditions of Chicanos in the United States as well as maintaining linkages with the opposition in Mexico. Since the PLM was among the first organizations to openly advocate a violent revolution to end the Diaz regime, both the U.S. and Mexican governments began to intensively monitor their activities, suppress the party’s newspaper—Regeneracion—and file numerous lawsuits against the leadership to blunt their influence on the deteriorating political situation in Mexico. The irregular publication of Regeneracion, in particular, was a galling affront to the Diaz regime because of its insightful analysis of the Mexican political establishment, strong support for labor movements in both countries, and advocacy of rebellion. Since the Mexican government could not dismantle the PLM, it recruited the U.S. government to assist in limiting party activities in a failed effort to terminate the organization’s influence. Despite constant threats, police activities, confiscation of publications, the Magons persisted in attempts to foment revolution (Quinones 1973). These efforts eventually resulted in a rapid abandonment of offices in South Texas for the growing barrios of Los Angeles. Why Los Angeles? There was a growing Chicana/o community that was perceived to be a strategic distance from the border communities in which the PLM and other oppositional groups could develop support for political reforms in Mexico. Also, the Magons were hoping for a respite from years of harassment and financial difficulties. Los Angeles would be no different in terms of the continued surveillance from state authorities (Quinones 1973). However, they did find a committed and sympathetic

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reception within the community in support of their political opposition to both the Mexican elite and racism in the United States. For a ten-year period, the PLM, although weakened by years of harassment provided political leadership to Los Angeles’ barrios. The revolution that they advocated would eventually restructure Mexican society; their advocacy occurred in an era of massive migration (Acuna 1972; Martinez 2001) that transformed urban and social relations in the Southwest. The impact of this significant demographic shift restructured Chicana/o urbanism in South Texas and Southern California. By the late 1920s, Chicanas/os in Los Angeles had numerically superseded the population of Chicanas/os in San Antonio. Within a decade, Los Angeles had the second largest concentration of Chicanas/os and Mexicanas/os in North America (Romo 1983). The growth of barrios, driven initially by political reasons, was subsequently interconnected with the rapid expansion of the regional economy. Los Angeles’ boosterism succeeded far beyond the dreams of the civic elite (Starr 1990). In the 1920s and 1930s the city again began to restructure itself into the skeleton of a sprawl city that currently characterizes the region. This expansion demanded a significant level of lowwage labor for a range of sectors. Agriculture remained a significant industry, but it was supplemented by manufacturing, real estate development, domestic services, furniture, and trucking. The increased demand for low-wage labor translated into an economic reliance on migrants from Mexico and internal migration of Chicanas/os from other sectors of the Southwest into Southern California. The rapid increase in the population created severe overcrowding and low vacancy rates in the two main barrios. This pressure on affordable housing generated a movement eastward of the Los Angeles River into the multi-ethnic Euro-American Boyle Heights community (Sanchez 1993; Romo 1983). This accelerated during the 1930s with the brutal dismantling of Los Angeles’ Chinatown, a decrepit residential zone. Civic elites planned a major railroad station in the central city, and Chinatown thus became the first ethnic community to be demolished for urban renewal. Ironically, by the late 1920s, due to anti-Asian immigration laws, Chicanas/os constituted the majority in this deteriorated tenement district (Romo 1983). Civic leaders designated Sonora Town as the area of relocation for the Chinese community, leading to its transition into a new “Chinatown.” The forced internal migration also had a secondary residual urban impact: a substantial increase in relocations east into Boyle Heights, City Terrace, Belvedere, Lincoln Heights, and Joyo Maravilla. These communities would, within two decades, forge a new urban social and cultural environment—East L.A., which became the largest urban barrio in the United States. With the expansion of the industrial zone along the west bank of the river, a significant influx into East L.A. occurred in the late 1920s and 1930s (Romo 1983; Sanchez 1993). In conjunction with the out-migration of Euro-Americans to the rapidly expanding suburbs, East L.A. was on the threshold of becoming a Chicana/o city.

The Significance of the Initial Era of Urban Barrio Formation The distinctly specified and strictly segregated barrios were controlled zones characterized by political repression and uneven development. The type that emerged in this earliest period initiated the formation of barrio spatial relations that would persist

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throughout the century. While a few barrios were demolished and others overwhelmed by industrial and/or commercial expansion, a majority of urban barrios remained intact during this early period of urbanization. Three social forces—natural population growth, migration into regional labor markets, and immigration from Mexico—placed increasing demands on adjacent residential neighborhoods. In the early 1900s, this gradual influence on urban patterns was modest during a period when Chicanas/os constituted approximately 7 to 10 percent of the Southwest (Martinez 2001, 7). (Chicanos in five states—Texas, California, New Mexico, Colorado, and Arizona—constituted 98 percent of the entire U.S. population of Chicanas/ os.) As a distinct minority, barrio residents were powerless to address segregation, discrimination, or the dominance of cities by urban cartels unconcerned with their interests. What in fact was occurring was a dual logic: the evolution of urban barrio culture and the social reconstruction of spatial relations. In response to the repressive economic and social conditions of the first half of the twentieth century, the collective experience of native Chicanas/os and Tejanas/os, along with that of migrants from Mexico, established the contours of barrio social relations. The barrio is a cultural community driven internally by family, ethnic identity, and history (Camarillo 1993; Cayo-Sexton 1965; Acosta and Winegarten 2003; Arreola 2002). The evolution of that culture also fed political resistance to systemic oppression, one result of which was that barrios were oases in a sea of hostility. Within this spatial and social history, Spanish language, Mexicana/o and border culture, religion and identity produced the abstract yet tangible symbolism of “el barrio.” That space, especially in major cities, began a historical expansion during the late 1930s and early 1940s due to population growth fed in part by the Bracero Program, a federal initiative that allowed for increased Mexican migration into the United States. While undervalued by urban planning and sociology, the social construction of the barrio, in terms of socio-spatial relations, economics, and politics, were essentially established during this period. The barrio as an urban-social space of pedestrians, dense mixed housing types, commercial retail directly within residential zones, and a community that daily celebrates its own existence is not “new”: it is historically rooted. In fact, at the beginning of the new millennium, the fact that some planners are racing to “discover” yet another new urbanism is ironic because their vision is a reiteration of the spatial and cultural history of el barrio, a fact that is rarely acknowledged. The social construction of barrio cultural and spatial relations created the future urban tensions and contradictions that governed urban policy in the post-World War II expansionist period. Urban renewal, the location of highway corridors, intensive industrial growth, and rampant real estate speculation would negatively impact barrios, causing massive problems. Urban renewal in particular offered the urban cartel an opportunity to reclaim civic center space from Chicanas/os. Ironically, these same regressive forces also led to the expansion of barrio geography, a consequence that has been virulently resisted by the real estate industry since the early 1900s. The next stage of urbanization also saw an increasingly sophisticated political, social, and urban resistance. Public housing policy, community destruction, the crisis in public education, and the lack of political access were all issues that would be tackled with increasing force by the urban barrios in the progressive Chicano Power movement of the 1960s.

3 Barrio Logic and the Consolidation of Chicanas/os in the City: 1945–1975 Suburban expansion after World War II would eventually complicate the economy and social characteristics of urban barrios. However, during the initial period of suburban sprawl, Chicana/o homeowners remained shackled by both state and private sector discriminatory policies that severely limited residential choice. The housing demand produced by this residential apartheid (Massey and Denton 1993; Lopez 1986) created socio-political barriers that ensured that overcrowded, underdeveloped barrios remained central to regional spatial logic. Despite this regressive reality, transformative change was on the political horizon. Furthermore, demographic projections indicated a significant pending shift in the population characteristics of metropolitan regions in the Southwest. Those estimates indicated that Chicanas/os would become the majority population or a significant minority within a generation. Thus, the demographic projections were a cause for concern to urban elites, who envisioned the transformation of the cultural and social dynamics of cities. In the immediate aftermath of World War II, minorities still faced systemic discrimination. Jim Crow social practices, residential segregation, discriminatory educational systems, structural employment barriers, and regressive urban policy remained unresolved (Acuna 1972; Branch 1988; Barrera 1979). In particular, residential apartheid and economic discrimination were rampant throughout the country. The initial era of urban renewal, made famous by urban planners’ use of eminent domain to destroy communities (Weiss 1985; Anderson 1964; Wilson 1966), intensified social tension. Confronted by racist intransigence in all of its manifestations, minority resistance movements began to more forcefully challenge their second-tier social status and overt discrimination. The Civil Rights movement and the coinciding demand for economic rights fundamentally influenced urban policy, housing patterns, and the barrio. The Civil Rights movement incorporated two powerful logics: ending political marginalization and transforming economic relations between minorities and EuroAmericans (Branch 1988; Morris 1984). Urban civil rights activists of the 1960s focused on fair housing, minority economic development, access to colleges, and employment opportunity. The Johnson Administration Congress responded with a massive federally funded urban policy, the War on Poverty. The implementation of the Model Cities program, which served as the initial phase in the transformation of the urbanization patterns of Chicanas/os and Afro-Americans, was intended to reconstruct urban social and spatial relations. The formative years of suburbanization, heavily subsidized and highly dependent on state policy, excluded minorities. The population growth of Chicanas/os in the Southwest created early pressure to “open up the suburbs” since barrio spatial limitations were

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insufficient to address housing demands. Also, luchas against employment and educational discrimination, initially demanded by the GI Forum, a Chicano World War II veterans’ group, had only a small impact on income growth and housing opportunities. But the refusal of these veterans to acknowledge that Jim Crow laws would govern their future created the basis for an oppositional resistance, leading to the development of Chicana/o civil rights advocacy (Quinones 1990). Within twenty years, three hundred years of history was challenged in the courts and, mainly, the streets of urban America. When the 1960s minority youth generation rejected a reformist, nonviolent strategy to change regressive laws and social practices, chaos and conflict were a product. In the aftermath, both civil rights legislation and federal urban policy ushered in the slow process of social transformation, spatial realignment, economic and educational inclusion, and political empowerment, which were all factors that led to a new duality: the decomposition of the barrio and the increased migration of Chicanas/os into the selected suburbs. These massive urban renewal and public works projects, however, eliminated thousands of affordable housing units in ghettoes and barrios (Kraus 2000; Gotham 2002, 83). This, in turn, increased Latina/o discontent over housing. The combination of displacement, housing losses, population increase, and low wages virtually mandated substandard, severely overcrowded housing. The limited “opportunities” that did exist were mainly in adjacent neighborhoods. What resulted from the contradictions of public policy was a spatial transition, that is, migration from urban barrios. This initiated an expansion of the geography of barrios, eventually leading to the creation of the first Chicana/o working-class suburbs in the Southwest. Concurrent forces led to demands for the reform of banking and real estate industry practices that discriminated against residents. Federal policies structurally precluded minorities from suburban housing opportunities (Meyer 2000; Squires 1994), but it is questionable whether a racist real estate industry required motivation from the government to openly practice discrimination. Here the Civil Rights movement was at its most controversial, since the imposition of reforms translated into the movement of minorities into previously shielded white residential zones. Nothing in the post-Civil Rights era was more controversial than the movement of Chicana/o or Afro-American families into predominately Euro-American residential zones (Meyer 2000; Squires 1994; Massey and Denton 1993). The first Chicana/o urban resistance movements emerged in the 1950s to protest discriminatory polices in public housing, neighborhood destruction, and redevelopment. Although largely unsuccessful, the protests established an oppositional consciousness that led directly to the Chicano Power Era. That era, which began in the 1960s, saw a number of victories throughout the western United States in subsequent decades. The Crusade for Justice in Denver (Vigil 1999) was a key precursor of the environmental justice movement. Chicanas/os in the Logan Heights barrio of San Diego organized an early resistance movement against regressive urban policy in the Southwest. Tejanas/os in El Paso and San Antonio challenged the local urban cartel on housing, infrastructure, and education. Land grant movements in New Mexico addressed economic disenfranchisement and resource allocation. These changes would transform both the barrio and urbanization patterns in the Southwest. An emerging Chicana/o middle-class sought improved housing quality along

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with newer schools and better employment opportunities. They were no longer bounded by the social construction of the barrio. Civil rights reforms had created social and economic changes that gradually shifted Chicana/o spatial relations onto the regional level. While in its infancy, this period of transition constituted the fundamental era leading to the eventual transformation of the cities of the Southwest. In the same era a unique spatial-cultural logic developed—the barrio became a “state of mind.” With the gradual out-migration of many Chicanas/os from the barrio, a new system of social relations emerged. El barrio became the historical heart of the expanding Chicana/o urban population, irrespective of whether they lived in it or not. The bonds of identity and resistance were integral to the socio-cultural logic of this urban experience. The barrio as a state of mind was a powerful influence on identity, family, and community. The symbolic and real essence of the barrio transcended its earlier social construction as an ethnically bounded location through the re-creation of vibrant social networks characterizing urban Chicana/o everyday life. In the new world of post-Civil Rights social relations, el barrio was synonymous with patria in the logic of culture. The history of repression and resistance was not forgotten as Chicanas/os suburbanized (Davis 2000).

The Post-World War II Social Construction and Reconstruction of Barrio Spatial Relations Post-World War II federal urban policy adhered to two major strategies: massive infrastructure subsidies catering to suburban expansion (Jackson 1985) and redevelopment policies that provided broad leeway for the urban cartel to destroy slums and barrios (Kleniewski 1984; Weiss 1985). The level of support for lower-income urban communities paled in comparison to the substantial federal investment in infrastructure for broader regional development. The question of who benefits from federal urban policy could no longer remain hidden. Yet, because of political marginalization, this question was rarely posed in the realm of public policy. Suburbia would remain the focal point of urban policy, and it treated the issue as noncontroversial. Nonetheless, the urban crisis of barrios and ghettoes remained highly controversial and difficult. It was during this era that surging population growth significantly increased pressure on barrio housing stock. Because federal law prohibited sale of homes guaranteed by Fanny Mae, Chicanas/os were “locked out” of newly developing suburban zones (Squires 1994; Massey and Denton 1993). Barrios, established in the late 1800s, had only expanded gradually along the periphery, a growth that was inadequate in relation to the pressures of overcrowding, dilapidated housing conditions, and increased migration into cities. Furthermore, the continuing industrialization of the Southwest demanded a new labor force of which this populace became the central component. Thus, barrios that had never totally addressed the housing demand were rapidly transformed into extremely dense, economically depressed urban zones. Since a significant percentage of Chicana/o labor was in skilled and semi-skilled trades, Chicanas/os constituted an important sector of the building trades that constructed the suburbs. Ironically, those same Chicana/o carpenters could neither afford to build homes to meet their family housing demands nor qualify for loans to move into the areas

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in which their labor was essential. This was (and is) among the ultimate contradictions of capitalism in land markets of the Southwest. The Bracero Program also impacted barrio urban conditions (Martinez 2001; Barrera 1979). Originally conceived as a response to agricultural labor shortages during World War II, this “guest worker program” allowed for a large migration of low-wage labor into both rural and urban regions of the Southwest. The politically powerful agriculture industry successfully defeated numerous efforts to end the program, which had been mandated in the original legislation (Acuna 1972). It can be argued that conservative agricultural interests were among the major reasons for the substantial and constant growth of the Chicana/o population in the post-World War II period. Their demand for Mexicana/o labor has proven to be insatiable, then and today. Another sector of urban public policy radically scarred the barrio landscape: state highway transportation agencies. Throughout the Southwest, urban barrios proved to be the “location of choice” for the urban elites who decided where highway routes would be located. Without representation, barrios were effectively attacked by state transportation departments, who had support from the federal highway administration. East Los Angeles (East L.A.) would suffer the worst from this bureaucratic logic. This barrio had numerous vibrant and cohesive neighborhoods that were either eradicated or radically reconstructed with the imposition of five distinct freeway routes. Thousands of housing units were lost, never to be replaced. Although the level of urban devastation of East L.A. was the worst case of this type, it was not unique: similar episodes occurred throughout the Southwest. Cities utilized highway route designation as a convenient, cost-effective method to either destabilize and/or eliminate minority-controlled space (Gotham 2002). This strategy served two objectives: facilitating economic growth and eliminating barrios without the need for redevelopment. This practice devastated the barrio economy, because many street routes had significant Chicana/o ownership patterns of real estate and commercial property. Thus, where some semblance of economic power had existed, that progress was effectively and rapidly dismantled. The imposition of freeway routes also had (and still has) two major negative economic impacts. The massive destruction of street commerce isolated neighborhoods, created economic dead zones, permanently ruptured social relations, and further exacerbated the housing crisis when relocated families moved into other overcrowded areas. Numerous barrios never recovered. One aspect of federal policy, although indirect, had an important role in the evolution of housing choice. World War II veterans were provided numerous benefits from the GI Bill, mainly in housing and education, two areas notorious for race-based discrimination. Many of these returning veterans were minorities, and they vigorously opposed the reinstatement of a Jim Crow regime, placing them in direct conflict with conservatives (Morris 1984). These veterans demanded better housing and employment opportunities, forming a vanguard for the evolution of the modern Civil Rights movement. While these demands for fair housing were inconsequential in impacting home ownership patterns in the early post-World War II era, they eventually led efforts to “open up the suburbs” (which in turn marginally increased minority access to working-class housing outside the barrio). In the 1950s, urban barrios were, in reality, communities under siege, socially, politically, economically, and spatially (Acuna 1972). The early struggles of the Civil Rights movement in the 1950s lacked the power to fundamentally change discriminatory

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urban policies and practices, and the broader urban spatial transformation was the effective reconcentration of Chicanas/os within segregated zones. Although they had started to achieve a level of economic security that coincided with the industrialization in key Southwest cities, Chicanas/os remained vulnerable to regressive real estate and banking industry policies (Squires 1994; Dymski et al. 1991). A related problem was that public housing authorities openly discriminated against minority applicants in favor of Euro-Americans (Garcia 1994). One of the first housing luchas occurred in East L.A. in the mid-1950s, led by the historic Civil Rights leader Bert Corona. The goal was to end anti-Chicana/o discrimination within the Los Angeles City Housing Authority (Garcia 1994). The urban cartel ignored the fundamental issues that plagued barrios. Infrastructure needs were only addressed when they were connected to the requirements of the regional economy. Barrio open space became increasingly smaller as local governments focused on creating other institutions—police stations, court houses, the occasional library, and medical clinic—without any consideration of replacing lost space. The crisis of the barrio would motivate young minorities to take to the streets in the 1960s to protest the political repression and failed urban policies of the 1950s.

The Social Construction of the Barrio To many Euro-Americans, “el barrio” as a symbol has been at once mysterious, quaint, threatening, and fascinating (Ponce 1995, 10). El barrio presents a challenge to the social identity of Euro-American society. Everyday culture in the barrio constitutes a community that has captured space in its own vision (Lefebvre 1991a). Daily practices— walking, conversing, interacting—are fundamentally “different” from those dominant in Euro-American modernity (Darder 1991). In this cultural arena, Spanish language and Chicana/o culture establish a bond between generations, regions, and nationalities. This cultural logic has traditionally been anathema to Euro-American elites normatively confident in their control over politically marginalized constituencies. The unbounded character of barrio culture translates into an unknown. What are “they” talking about? Which concerns are oppositional? Why are Latinas/os stubbornly independent from the demands of a dominant culture? What is this internal cultural logic that establishes defenses in everyday life within a market system structured on social and economic repression? Cultural space, el barrio, develops a counterveiling logic that Mingione sees as a critical stage in political defense of community. “Exploitative social relations raise a certain degree of consciousness in the exploited. This consciousness is at first (logically, not historically) an individual one, but through political class organizations it becomes collective and inspires conflictual collective behavior” (1981, 31). This experience is a generationally created, culturally bounded social bastion in which what is repressed in the dominant culture is celebrated, produced, and reproduced in a vibrant defense of identity. That identity is embedded in everyday practices that value direct experience and conducting life on a humanistic level, the historic humanist tradition of city life over the rapidity of mass consumer culture and the anomie of modernity. Closeness, proximity, communal sharing, and long-term social relations also have political consequences.

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On two levels—the defense of identity and the continual reinterpretation of modern life—barrio culture challenges the dominant cultures’ incessant demands (ideological, political, and social) for subservience and “total acculturation.” Central to the schisms between minority and dominant culture has been a rejection of the very concept of “total acculturation.” Language, social practice, oppositional consciousness, the legacy of resistance, and social solidarity constitute a powerful identity confronting a hegemonic elite culture in this context (Darder 1991). Coinciding with the deterioration and difficult housing conditions characteristic of barrio spatial relations, there exists a vision of identity that positively responds to the repressive attack on Chicana/o culture that permeated American society through the 1970s. Chicana/o youths were punished for their language, harassed by police, rejected by potential employers, and ignored in schools. Parents were denied loans, promotions, and access to civic spaces. Latinas were stereotyped as permissive, ignorant, and docile (Romero et al. 1997). It was (is?) a society that generationally, mainly through educational institutions, denied Chicanas/os hope for the future (Darder 1991; Foley 1990). The symbolic space of barrio everyday life created not only a respite from this racism, but also a nurturing cultural community that maintained its own history, mainly oral, of those stories—both humorous and tragic—of resistance to repression. For example, oral history provides a distinctly different interpretation of one of the most brutal attacks on a Chicana/o community, the 1943 Zoot Suit Riots in Los Angeles. The media of that era and, subsequently, historians “documented” the way that young Chicanos were violently attacked. However, the reality on the Eastside was markedly different from the media’s account. Within the barrio, those sailors who ventured out of the security of downtown and the sanctions of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) were also beaten and abused, essentially run out of East L.A. by Chicanos who strategized to defend their barrio. The media’s failure to report that sailors were “bloodied, beaten and …hospitalized” was only one small aspect of the official censorship of the barrio during that era. The Zoot Suit Riots were not as one-sided as history portrays. This is one example of the many “traditions of resistance in defense of space,” mainly linked to the brutality of a virtual police state in the Southwest, which are essential elements of the social and oral history of the barrio. Conversely, Barrio social relations cannot be defined solely as a culture of resistance. It is also a culture of celebration (Arreola 2002; Rojas 1999; Villa 2000; Tatum 2001; Gamez 2002). The eclectic use of color resonates into the urban streetscape. Music blares from front yard parties, cars, and stores. Jardins, patios, and ornate front yards re-creates space in a different vision. The active use of space by family, friends, and community is a major characteristic of barrio life. The large numbers of children are watched over by tias, comadres y abuelas. Primas y amigas have developed a sophisticated social networking system. Carnales discuss futbol or other social events. These are scenes that infuse vitality into the cultural logic in daily life. This is the essence of barrio cultural life, and it stands in direct opposition to the sterile, suburban cultural conventions that developed simultaneously in that era. El barrio and suburbia offer two contradictory examples of what constitutes everyday life in American urban society. The active use of space constantly challenges the isolationist logic of the larger consumerist society. The typical barrio kitchen table has a communal logic: there is always room for another plate, conversation, and time. A family’s children are the

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children of everyone in the neighborhood. Evening and weekend social activity involves extended social networks. Cross-generational households transfer decades of cultural history. Children and parents parade to church, shopping, or social events. One aspect of barrio culture that has not changed during the modern era is that the streets are alive with a melange of intergenerational relationships. When Chicanas/os migrated into working-class suburbs, the daily interactions changed. It is during this era that the importance of barrio cultural logic shifted into a symbolic power. El barrio, as a “state of mind” represented more than space. It symbolized the cultural lineage of Chicana/o social and political history. In this period of suburbanization, the barrio was transformed into both a spatially defined location, and, just as importantly, an increasingly essential resource of cultural memory, identity, and pride. It would continue to be central to Chicana/o life irrespective of how the community redefined itself spatially in the future. Shifting the conceptualization of the barrio into “a state of mind” has in turn infused other Chicana/o urbanist communities with the communal features of barrio life. Those major barrio calles—Santa Fe Drive, Thirty-eighth Avenue, Guadalupe Street, Whittier Boulevard, Brooklyn and Soto, South fourth Street, Sixth Street, Monroe Street—along with innumerable avenidas, created regional cultural linkages that were never abandoned. The memories of the parks, schools, and social clubs of these past eras still have a cultural vitality that persists into the current era. The retention of historical memory, “el barrio as a state of mind,” an embedded cultural consciousness, is reflected in what Valle and Torres describe as the “Greater Eastside” (2000). That lineage exists in virtually every major barrio in the Southwest.

The Second Wave of Chicana/o Urbanism Gottdiener’s identification of the polynucleated city (1985) is possibly the best theoretical explanation for the evolution and the complexity of the myriad urban/suburban centers characteristic of Southern California urbanism that have been reproduced in innumerable regions since the 1960s. This term also has relevance for the spatial and demographic changes in the cities of the Southwest that expanded rapidly beginning in the 1970s. Barrios in a number of major cities—for instance San Antonio, Houston, San Jose, San Diego, Phoenix, Denver, Albuquerque, and Sacramento—shared a number of urban characteristics. The housing stock was constructed between the late 1800s and 1940. The condition of the built environment was either declining or exhibiting signs of severe deterioration. A range of housing types—single detached homes, duplexes, small bungalow units, two-story apartments, derelict structures (sometimes all on the same block)—was a normative characteristic of the streetscape. Limited private sector investment, mainly by speculators intent on extracting the highest level of ground rents, was typical within this sector of the housing market (Rodriguez 1994). Housing was overcrowded and substandard. Conversely, due to limited housing opportunities, vacancy rates were low, given the generally poor quality of housing. Commercial districts were locally oriented, with a specific focus on either the consumer demands of barrio residents or on services tailored to the local community. The urban infrastructure was undermaintained, with substandard alleys, loading areas, and

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parking. By the 1970s, barrio businesses located in the oldest working-class zones of cities were basically neglected by city governments. Meanwhile, they faced serious problems such as the relatively modest purchasing power of their market base and competition from numerous other small businesses eking out a modest profit. The population expansion that began in the mid-1960s (Garcia 2003) imposed impossible pressures on the existing housing supply. The barrio could no longer address the substantial increase in housing demand. The confines of barrio spatial relations were on the cusp of a major transformation that would have a significant impact on urban social patterns by the late 1970s. Initially, barrios spilled over into adjacent neighborhoods, and neither the urban cartel nor the real estate industry could control this housing demand. El Paso, San Antonio, and East L.A. had transitioned into “Chicana/o cities,” spatially, economically, and socially. Other barrios were also dominating adjacent space and expanding their cultural presence spatially. A variety of factors contributed to the initial era of suburban migration from barrios in the 1960s. The most obvious was the housing crisis. Increased incomes due to unionized manufacturing sectors in the post-World War II era was the other critical factor (Bluestone and Harrison 1982). While restrictive covenants remained a barrier, new suburban opportunities generally emerged in zones close to traditional barrios. “White flight” from these areas offered opportunities for residential relocation (Rodriguez 1994; Meyer 2000). The real estate industry, confronted with a reconstruction in ethnic relations, now was economically forced to accommodate this increased housing demand. In some regions, ethnic relations and multi-ethnicity did not become problematic issues. In any event, numerous suburbs throughout the Southwest have had a significant influx of Chicanas/os since the 1960s. Barrio space experienced a period of spatial devastation from aggressive local redevelopment policies that destroyed housing adjacent to favored economic zones. Occasionally, institutions such as colleges in Chicago and Denver claimed eminent domain to expand. Freeway route selection was another factor that led to the net loss of affordable housing. Highway routes were devised to create ethnic barriers and/or to conveniently clear slums (Kraus 2000). In both instances, virtually no replacement housing, either for renters or owners, was offered to displaced families. City officials generally followed the vague planning principle that assumed regional housing opportunities were sufficient to address this social dislocation (Dagodag 1972). The demographic dynamic of larger household size was another factor. The average Chicana/o household is larger than the average Euro-American household (Garcia 2003). Consequently, suburbs, with their larger houses, were attractive. Those families who remained in the barrio were now placing substantial demands on a declining housing stock. This population expansion demanded a solution to the residential apartheid that had continued to affect Chicanas/os in barrios. Demographic pressures converged with other social changes from the Civil Rights era. Fair housing legislation forced gradual changes in real estate industry practices in selected suburbs; however, minorities encountered strong resistance in these zones (Citizen’s Commission on Civil Rights 1986). Nevertheless, constant suburban growth generated a high level of mobility into outer ring zones. Increased earning power, veterans benefits, and white flight “opened” a few working-class suburbs to minority households. Although redlining complicated access to capital, mortgage lending did

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improve slightly. This migration into suburbs formed the first significant demographic shift from the barrio. The era of strict adherence to Jim Crow social policy in relation to residential zones was ending. As older suburbs matured, regional development entered into a second period: regional sprawl, in which new zones far from the historic civic center enticed a new wave of suburbanites away from inner ring suburbs (Orfield 2002). Ironically, this second wave of out-migration resulted in the establishment of the first working-class Chicana/o suburbs. These communities consisted of modest two- and three-bedroom homes built during the early 1950s. They were located away from traditional barrios and near regional employment centers. Pico Rivera, approximately fifteen miles east of Los Angeles, emerged as one of the first suburbs with a significant Chicana/o populace. The demographic shift occurred mainly during the 1960s, the period of social transition for communities ringing the civic center. This community pointed to the future: a rapid ethnic change due mainly to the early erosion of residential segregation and the housing demands of Chicanos. Strategically, housing opportunities in this suburb also generated momentum for suburban expansion into the central San Gabriel Valley. By the end of this era of urbanization, La Puente, Baldwin Park, South El Monte, and El Monte had significant Chicana/o communities. By the late 1960s East L.A. was a self-contained “Chicana/o city” and had the largest urban geography of Latinas/os in the nation. It changed the demographic character of adjacent, previously Euro-American suburbs. Montebello, Monterey Park, Pico Rivera, and the City of Commerce saw a rapid increase in Chicano households. East L.A. was thus the generator of an unprecedented Chicana/o conurbanization. The socio-spatial characteristics of the barrio also began to become apparent in the suburbs. The greater Eastside, identified by Valle and Torres, was converging into a major urban formation that would eventually link East L.A. socially, culturally, and spatially to working-class suburbs twenty miles east of Los Angeles. East L.A. was not the only barrio in which this spatial transformation reconstructed the demographics of suburban expansion. It was and is, however, the most substantial within the context of Chicana/o urbanism. However, this process, a product of overextended barrio housing stock, civil rights reforms, and increased earning power, impacted virtually every major city in the Southwest by the mid-1970s. San Antonio, Phoenix, Denver, El Paso, Houston, Albuquerque, Sacramento, San Jose, and San Diego all experienced a similar dual socio-demographic shift, with migration into suburbs and the expansion of barrio urban boundaries. The initial migration was into older, modest communities. There remained significant zones in which the banking and real estate industries conspired to maintain strictly constructed “lily white” zones (Meyer 2002).

The Spatial and Economic Contradictions of El Barrio The bifurcation of Chicana/o housing preferences and changing urbanization patterns also had consequences for the barrio. In the aftermath of the most brutal period of urban transformation—accelerated uneven development, the destruction of vibrant neighborhoods by freeway construction and eminent domain, constant structural

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deterioration, the early failure of Model Cities programs to revitalize working-class zones, and increased real estate speculation—the built environment of the barrio entered into an accelerated era of decomposition. During this period, the highest wage earners left the barrio, changing past patterns of recycling home ownership and modest locally driven reinvestment. As a counterpart to this move, consumer spending power migrated into suburbs. The barrio retained its cultural and historic legacy as an entry zone for newer migrants—in particular, low-wage labor—into the metropolis. El barrio was yet again confronting structural crises. The housing crisis of that era led to rampant speculation. While property values in lower-income zones were generally significantly lower than the regional land market, rents were inordinately high due to the acute lack of supply and residential apartheid. Partly as a consequence, the urban scale of internal residential streets began to change from mainly single-family units into an eclectic mix of small and mid-sized apartments. In major cities, large apartment complexes were built in low-density residential streets. Without political influence, barrio residents were powerless to address the densification that was negatively impacting youth socialization and alienation. Historically situated in an “irregular economy” (Dallago 1990; LopezGarza 2001) with a repressive labor market and wage regime (Barrera 1979; Morales and Bonilla 1993), Chicanas/os had lower household incomes and a higher percentage of families at or below federal poverty income levels throughout this period (Garcia 2003). This influenced both the type and quality of housing options. It also “locked residents into a limited range of alternatives”: low-quality and illegal units, overcrowded situations, deteriorating older houses, and/or homelessness. This difficult set of “options” led directly to a range of social crises, both personal and communitywide. The psychological burdens related to financial stresses and housing crises were and are a major cause of individual and family dysfunction. The crisis in housing—in essence the failure of both the private market and the state to fundamentally address the supply question—was leading directly to social crises. In addition, rent gouging placed an inordinate burden on the local economy. Reduced expendable income translated into weak business formation and very little reinvestment. While consumer loyalty did provide a modest profit, owners still had to engage in lowscale credit and barter to maintain operations. Extension of personal credit, trading work, and other forms of exchange fused normal business operations with the local underground economy. The Latina/o business community, wholly dependent on barrio economic conditions, struggled to survive. Limited access to capital weakened attempts to enter into the regional economy, mandating that barrio business districts retain an insular linkage within barrio culture. The modern Southwest economy is predicated on a substantial low-wage labor force for manufacturing, landscaping, domestic work, day care, tourism, hotels, and commercial and residential construction. While a constant demand for immigrant labor characterizes the history of the region (Barrera 1979; Acuna 1988), the postwar era ushered in a structural change: whereas the agriculture industry dominated the demand for labor before, now there was a demand for workers in the industry of suburban expansion. Ironically, the urban cartel, which had ignored urban crises in barrios, was as responsible as any economic sector for the migration of Chicanas/os into suburbs.

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The New Relationship between Chicanas/os and the City Demographic change influenced both urban culture and spatial relations. The traditional boundaries of the barrio, while celebrated and respected in social memory, had significantly expanded. The barrio—that highly specified, segregated zone—had surged beyond its past into adjacent communities. In the Southwest, entire new urban zones that were predominately Chicana/o exhibited the importance of communal space that cannot be (solely) reduced to a category of political economy (Gottdiener 1984). No longer was the barrio a quaint, historic space. It was a major sector of the city, involving tens of square miles of Chicana/o urbanism—an unprecedented situation in modern U.S. urban history. Concurrently, suburbia was also impacted fundamentally by this spatial transition. Ringing the barrio was a system of working-class suburbs. A growing percentage of households relocated into predominately Euro-American suburban enclaves. From the late 1960s and into the 1980s, cities experienced strong pressures to expand housing opportunities into zones that had historically excluded Chicanas/os. The culture of the city was increasingly being redefined by these changing urbanization patterns. The culture of multi-ethnicity was becoming a shaping social force in urban life. El barrio, so central to Chicana/o culture, was now present in a suburbia that had for so long exhibited a paranoia of difference (Young 2000; Bowser and Hunt 1996). This period of ethnic transition was not without conflict and difficulty. White resistance, in the form of overt violence or stark social isolation (Bowser and Hunt 1996), continued well into the 1980s. However, the power of history, inherent in the demographic transformation of the Southwest, would eventually overwhelm remaining vestiges of historic racism and animosity against the region’s largest ethnic minority. By 1975 the reality of a new Chicana/o urbanism in all of its manifestations—cultural, social, political, economic, and psychological—had become a fundamental component of urban society. Concurrently, barrio culture was also transforming. The youth generation of the 1960s—the first generation to directly benefit from the heroic struggles of the Civil Rights era—was in the process of leaving the barrio. Affirmative action, antiemployment discrimination, fair housing policies, and university admissions related to legislation and lawsuits provided abundant economic opportunities to Chicanas/os for the first time in the nation’s history (De Anda 1996; Skrentny 2002). This transition was crystallized by those who returned to the barrio offering their skills and to abuelos y abuelas who had been denied such opportunities during the bitter winter of racism in America. This generation replicated a main pattern of suburban migration: middle class flight. This produced an internal conflict—the power of culture and place juxtaposed with the prospect of “enhanced opportunity”—but it was grudgingly encouraged by an older generation structurally denied the ability to fulfill their dreams. Yet that social and economic transformation translated into a change in barrio social relations. The generational, multi-class-based culture of the barrio transitioned into regional social networks. No longer were families connected within segregated zones. Expanded social relations and networks began to replace the internal logic of the barrio and its history of tightly woven daily encounters. The linkages, while powerful and historic, also had to respond to new social realities inherent in Chicana/o urbanism. Geographic distance

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shifted the locus of social relations, while simultaneously connecting Chicanas/os in suburbs back to the barrio. El barrio was also being transposed on suburbia. In its dynamic early period, Chicana/o urbanism created a dualistic regional sociocultural system. The cultural history of the barrio—characterized best by its oppositional consciousness against a reality of political repression, racism, and discrimination— proved too powerful to neglect. Chicanas/os in suburbia, whether in predominately working-class suburbs or exclusionary “lily white” zones, retained a cultural lineage in which the barrio remained central to everyday life. That memory translated into frequent family visits, food, cultural activities, political events, and meetings. The power of place remained vibrant throughout this period of urban transformation. The dynamic reality of Chicana/o urbanization patterns during that era resulted in changes in the social relations of old barrios themselves. Newer immigrants rapidly took over the housing now available because of this class-oriented out-migration. The barrio began a new era of concentrated poverty. Neighborhoods featured a mix of distinctly older, long-tenured homeowners and younger, lower-income renters. Family size, while smaller than in previous generations, remained larger than the regional norm (Martinez 2001; Saenz and Greenless 1996). People younger than twenty-one composed the dominant age group in the community (Saenz and Greenless 1996). Thus, the social burdens on a limited affordable housing supply, overcrowded schools, inadequate parks and recreational amenities, and an acute lack of local employment opportunities recompressed the social crises of the modern urban barrio. Poverty, whether related to low wages, unemployment, or single person-headed households, characterized socioeconomic conditions. In reality, it was not a substantial change from the history of underdevelopment in the Southwest. The urban problematic resided in the fact that the first era of federally directed revitalization programs only minimally ameliorated blight and deterioration. The affordable housing crisis, in particular, has been a permanent structural problem of working-class districts (Weiss 1985; O’Connor 1999). The modern phase of the decomposition of the barrio coincided with new forms of racism in planning and urban policy. With the future of the barrio in the balance, an enlightened state response did not appear to be in the offing. In the last quarter of the twentieth century, historic racism in public policy would prove to be a monumental hurdle. The logic of trickle-down planning theory—i.e., resources dominated by downtown urban elites—simply could not address at an adequate level the urban crisis of the barrio. Meanwhile, urbanization patterns in the Southwest and elsewhere in the United States were themselves on the verge of a historic transformation—the maturing of Chicana/o urbanism.

4 Transformation of Regional Culture and the Impact of Civil Rights Reforms on Racist Real Estate and Banking Industry Practices: 1975–2000 The Modern Period and the Dual Nature of Chicana/o Urbanism The barrio in the modern era has proven wholly inadequate in addressing the housing demands of Latinas/os during the past twenty-five years. The demographic and social forces, addressed in the previous chapter, exposed the spatial limitations within the context of a population explosion that has transformed suburban culture in the cities of the Southwest. The demand for quality housing, which could only be achieved through out-migration, created the impetus for a new arena of multi-ethnic urbanism in the region. Increased expendable income, the result of a social policy triad of college opportunity, affirmative action, and legal challenges to employment discrimination, increased housing opportunities to a level that could only be envisioned optimistically a decade earlier. The period of minority “suburban pioneers” morphed into a mass migration into suburban neighborhoods throughout metropolitan regions from Texas to Arizona to New Mexico to Colorado to California. Consequently, broad swaths of the suburban landscape experienced significant socio-cultural transformation. The proverbial “lily white,” ethnically exclusive zones were introduced to a new cultural reality: Latinas/os were moving next door in large numbers. The politically sanctioned protective triggers, restrictive covenants, redlining, and racist real estate associations had lost the power to dictate spatial relations. While implementation of civil rights reforms were incremental during the first decade of change (Skrentny 2002), 1965–1975, the pace of social integration had a definitive influence on the culture of all metropolitan regions with significant Latina/o populations. With this relatively sanction-free suburban option, Latinas/os matriculated to both strong minority and non-minority communities. Irrespective of the subregional location, the future had arrived. By the late 1970s, this migration of Latinas/os into the suburbs had three major impacts: the expansion of the geography of dense urban barrios, the creation of suburban Latina/o enclaves, and the economic decline of the traditional barrio. East Los Angeles (East L.A.), due to its immense size, was the precursor for the dynamic urbanization occurring in other cities. Adjacent neighborhoods merged into substantial Latina/o zones in which the control of space began to accurately reflect the ethnic composition of regions. They were no longer forced, by history and repression, into dense and inadequate spatial configurations. The reach of the barrio surged throughout regions of the Southwest, creating a new period of Chicana/o urbanism.

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The clash of cultures that resulted did not produce the fear anticipated by EuroAmerican myths of subspecies and difference (Bowser and Hunt 1996). Minority households maintained their property, exhibited a strong work ethic, and had aspirations for their children, all typical of the history of middle-class transition. The clash related to the interpretation of everyday life in the city. The culture of barrios—knowing and appreciating the neighborhood, constant social interaction, and taking the time to talk— was “alien” to an atomized Euro-American-dominated suburban culture (Orfield 1986) that had basically rejected a main tenet of urban life that calls for communication and social networking within the immediate neighborhood. Conversely, staying behind closed doors and out of the front yard and internalizing daily life in front of a TV screen were anathema to the barrio lifestyle. With the influx, though, suburbia began to engage in a different spacio-cultural vision of life. Thus, on a dual-level, that is, socially driven interaction and the shattering of racist myths, the multi-ethnic city emerged. The 1980s ushered in the reconstruction of suburban culture in the cities of the Southwest and selected regions experiencing demographic change. In this period, the physical sprawl that characterized these regions was mirrored by a cultural transformation into the far reaches of suburbia (Suro and Singer 2002; Mendez 2003). This was a significant, if undervalued historically, dynamic of the last quarter of the twentieth century. But this transition would not achieve its historic impact until the 1990s. Southwest urbanization began to exhibit Chicana/o suburban rings, both in proximity to and distance from the civic center (Suro and Singer 2002; Mendez 2003). In essence, suburban expansion in the Southwest was being driven by rising demand for quality housing by the region’s largest minority group. The significant population expansion during this era demanded a spatial response—migration to housing wherever it existed. Three types of patterns emerged: (1) traditional barrios surging into adjacent neighborhoods; (2) cities and regions evolving into a system of intermittent Latina/o dominated zones, both suburban and inner city; and (3) traditional barrios growing disjointed from the migration of middle-class Latinas/os to a newly complex suburbia. Although the Los Angeles basin exhibits all three typologies, other cities experienced these patterns as well. El Paso is an example of the first scenario. El Segunda Barrio continued to expand into adjacent zones, creating a totally controlled Chicana/o urban zone. Phoenix, Denver, and Sacramento have evolved into the second typology, in which selected suburban communities have experienced significant multi-ethnic integration, while other adjacent zones have remained predominately Euro-American. Tucson, San Jose, and San Diego exhibit the third type of relationship, in which suburban migration has created a spatial and social distance from the traditional barrio. Logan Heights in San Diego is isolated from suburban patterns north of the central city, Tucson, mainly because its barrio was virtually destroyed, developed to a pattern of distinct ethnic zones. The San Gabriel Valley, east of downtown Los Angeles, was the earliest sub-region that displayed how demographic change would affect the future of suburban areas. From the late 1950s into the mid-1980s, this valley of approximately 1.2 million reflected how ethnic transition would change both the culture and ethnicity of the Southwest. Pico Rivera, initially a working-class Chicana/o suburb, pioneered the early migration from the historic East L.A. barrio. Within a generation, increased intraregional migration patterns established a series of ethnically diverse suburban communities. In addition,

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numerous Euro-American majority mid- and small-sized cities experienced a significant in-migration of Latinas/os into selected neighborhoods. By the end of the twentieth century, the San Gabriel Valley had crystallized the transformation of urbanism in both the Southwest and other sectors of the United States. Latinas/os had permeated every sector of a massive suburban subregion in an eclectic mix of majority-minority, minoritymajority cities and neighborhoods. The period from 1975 to 2000 signaled a maturing of both social relations and the initial rationalization of multi-ethnicity in urban culture, politics, and policy (Garcia 2003). Concurrently, the traditional barrio continued to confront a host of socio-urban policy crises. Existing social conditions were not being addressed. A distinct lower-class logic prevailed. School systems maintained an embarrassingly reprehensible 40 to 50 percent dropout rate and depressingly poor educational attainment throughout the past quarter century. Bilingual education—the only rational strategy to educate monolingual Spanishspeaking youth and prepare the next generation for the future—as well as bilingualism in public policy, business, and the workplace was constantly under siege, fiscally, philosophically, and by lingering racism (Garcia 1997). The historic failure of barriooriented public school systems only reinforced a legacy of neglect in other public policy arenas. While there has been occasional academic success, the pathetic reality of this society is that, on a percentage basis, those youth are the exception to this history of failure. That failure is validated annually by the fact that a substantial percentage of firstyear minority college students require remedial English and mathematic enhancement courses. Starting in the 1960s, economic restructuring was in the process of substantially lowering working-class wages (Bluestone and Harrison 1982). The gradual, then accelerated, loss of high-wage manufacturing employment forced a reduction in workingclass incomes. The dislocation of workers reversed historic minority wage gains (Bluestone and Harrison 1982). Both advanced- and entry-level employment at a highwage level dissipated within a fifteen-year period. Thus, the economy of the barrio became increasingly problematic. The declining spending power negatively impacted barrio business districts. Young adults experienced difficulties entering the labor force, a process that was problematic even in positive economic conditions. The economy restructured in such a way that low wages for undereducated, semi-skilled labor were systemic, and, consequently, incomes could not meet the regional cost of living demands (Pastor et al. 2000). The overcrowded, declining, and dated housing conditions continued to deteriorate. Yet demand remained high, which meant that real estate speculators had a structural advantage in even the worst housing situations. Open space and recreational amenities, the real safety net for the future, failed to address demands of the youth generation for proactive socialization experiences. When Congress “reformed” (read: made budget reductions to) the War on Poverty in the 1970s, youth programs were among the first to be cut. This sent a signal to cities that youth do not matter and are of minimal consequence in relation to community revitalization. Los Angeles’ barrios and ghettos suffered dearly. These cuts, with inadequate schools and poverty, ushered in an intense period of crack cocaine and methamphetamine gang turf wars over sales and distribution. By the mid-1980s, L.A. gangs had infiltrated drug markets throughout the nation. This period also brought death, despair, and disillusionment to an entire youth generation. Other than constant police harassment, the

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public policy response was embarrassingly minuscule for those youth attempting to escape an increasingly violent street culture. The “wooden nickels” of city budgets for recreational and cultural programming were considered expendable in relation to the fiscal crisis of the state during that era. The linchpins to positive socialization for the next generation—alternatives to drug lords, fast money, and violence; programs that had the potential to nurture and shelter youth by redirecting them into fun, proactive experiences—were left to falter. Urban culture and society suffered the consequences throughout the 1980s. The vicious youth gang wars of that period had a definitive impact on urban policy. Barrio property values declined while the broader real estate market boomed. Private sector investment vanished in fear—fear of both lost profits and physical safety. While subtle and incremental in comparison to the urban insurrections that characterized the 1960s, the economic damage of this period was more substantial in terms of declining property values, abandonment, and mounting administrative costs of the state. California entered into a period in which prison construction was the second largest annual line item in the state budget through the early 1990s. Other states in the Southwest followed, failing to link the contradictory urban and fiscal policies to social crises destroying the economy of barrios. The tragic loss of life, the difficulties of everyday life, a depressed wage structure, an increased cost of living, and the acute lack of opportunity begged a series of questions: who was actually benefiting from the massive redistributive policies set up by the Model Cities program in the late 1960s? What was actually being revitalized? Why were barrios in virtually the same socio-economic state of decomposition prior to the War on Poverty? Of what value were city planning and urban policy in response to barrio spatial and economic crises? Battered by the cross currents of a resistant urban cartel and regressive revitalization strategies that fundamentally resisted directly addressing urban crises (O’Connor 1999), barrios struggled to maintain a limited economy, cope with a desperate demand for affordable housing, and provide a semblance of social shelter for youth. Although the federal government had endorsed the concept that blighted, declining neighborhoods would be the central focus of urban policy the urban cartel blithely ignored that mandate to the detriment of barrios. What existed were recycled planning and policy failures that ensured the continuation of apartheid.

Racism, Redlining, and the New Era of Housing Opportunity Segregated housing patterns generated a significant demand for quality housing in suburban zones in the outer ring of metropolitan regions. A number of forces influenced this developing quest for improved housing conditions and opportunity. The most fundamental issue was the limited supply and declining condition of housing (Bratt et al. 1986; Hartman 1986). This housing stock was outmoded and inadequate in terms of housing size. Although affordable, it required significant reinvestment. The land market in urban barrios also exhibited lower appreciation value over time in relation to regional housing market trends.

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The spatial limitations of barrios were also a factor. Historically, the barrio has remained a dense, overcrowded social and physical environment. Prior to 1960, population growth rates severely tested the geographic confines of barrio space. However, social sanctions and spatial constriction could not be sustained during the rapid population expansion related to massive growth rates of the Latina/o population. The initial migration to working-class suburbs, not too distant from traditional barrios, was a response to the initial period of this demographic transformation. Older suburbs, in relative proximity to barrios, were the first zones that Chicanas/os in the Southwest pioneered. Popular culture also influenced demands for suburban housing opportunities. During the late 1950s and into the 1960s, both television sitcoms and the movie industry equated suburbs with social and economic empowerment, and centered their stories on the suburban home (Jackson 1985; Fishman 1987). This discourse was decidedly exclusionary: rarely were Latinas/os portrayed as relevant to the new social experiment of mass migration out of the city and into suburbs. But irrespective of the inherent racism in popular culture’s depiction of suburbs, the minority demand for quality housing opportunities in suburbs began to substantially increase in the mid-1970s. However, racist social practices and banking industry policies proved to be difficult impediments against the initial wave seeking quality housing opportunities. A decade after the historic Civil Rights era legislation, suburbia had retained its socially constructed identity as a “lily white” enclave. The real estate profession had been effective in defending ethnically cleansed suburban zones (Helper 1969). Potential minority homeowners exploring outer-ring suburbs were ignored, dissuaded, or discriminated against in defense of Euro-American hegemony. The banking industry had staunchly maintained racist redlining policies that effectively excluded minorities from market-rate home loans (Squires 1992; Dymski et al. 1991; Meyer 2000). The initial period of nondiscriminatory housing legislation rarely impacted the ethnic composition of suburbs (Citizens Commission on Civil Rights, 1986). It is within this historical contradiction—racism in defense of suburbia versus housing demands—that the influence of the Civil Rights movement helped to “open suburbia to multi-ethnicity,” first gradually and then permanently. Affirmative action, a term that remains polarizing and politically loaded, had a fundamental impact on the urbanization patterns of the Southwest. In two social arenas, the workplace and higher education, affirmative action created unprecedented change in income distribution patterns (Skrentny 2002). Minorities who had courageously challenged political marginalization and racism in the streets during the 1960s became the first beneficiaries of entrances into public and private colleges and universities in the 1970s. An unprecedented wave of minority high school graduates therefore entered into an institutional environment that had proved to be an insurmountable barrier to economic ascendancy to every generation that had preceded them. When this generation completed college and entered the labor force, suburban settlement patterns in the Southwest transformed dramatically. Challenges to employment discrimination, starting in the 1950s and 1960s, increased incomes in working-class sectors, especially in unionized manufacturing. On two levels—on the shop floor and at the professional level—the increased household income levels of that era provided the economic stimulus for quality suburban housing opportunities.

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Although important areas of discrimination that affirmative action legislation proposed to fundamentally reform—the dual-wage structure, ethnically stratified professional employment patterns, racism in senior management, denial of promotions, and unequal pay for equal worth—remain with us to this day (Skrentny 2002), the policy did have a beneficial impact on income growth for minorities and women. It was during the 1970s that affirmative action grudgingly forced Euro-Americans, who had economically benefited from racism, to accommodate change. Government employment policies substantially increased representation among women and minorities in the state labor force. Contractors dealing with the state were also impacted through the adoption of programs to ensure the participation of women- and minority-owned businesses in this lucrative sector of the regional economy (Wainwright 2000). This change was certainly controversial, given that white-owned businesses had long dominated the sector. However, it was essential for excluded business classes to gain entry because the benefits were immense. Numerous women-and minority-owned businesses, although never benefiting to the full extent of the law (Wainwright 2000), were able to significantly grow their businesses and expand their operations. For the first time, some barriocentered businesses became regional in scope. This dual level of income growth, via both the labor force and business expansion, required one more urban structural transformation. The fair housing legislation passed in the 1960s had not opened opportunities to the extent envisioned by federal and state legislators. Consequently, cities and regions began supporting aggressive fair housing councils to monitor the private sector and utilize the judiciary to break the legacy of racism in the housing market. Numerous examples of overt racism in housing that gained media attention and key lawsuits that forced recalcitrant owners to either rent or sell to minorities helped produce a minority migration to suburbs that would eventually restructure social relations throughout the Southwest. The Latina/o suburban pioneers of the 1950s and 1960s, who had long faced hostility and social isolation, were now joined by a second wave that was more significant on two levels: the new migrants had higher household incomes and they were located in suburbs much less hostile to multi-culturalism than in prior eras.

Locational Transformation in the Southwest Once the decomposition of social and legal sanctions against minorities in suburbia occurred, the era of Latina/o urbanism emerged in full force in the Southwest. Multiethnicity reconstructed the socio-cultural complexity of suburbia in the region. White bastions fractured starting in the early 1980s and throughout the 1990s. Latinas/os experienced a significantly different context of social accommodation, although ethnic friction and divisiveness did not disappear. Integration of public schools, public and private sector labor markets, and colleges led directly to an unprecedented period of suburban multi-ethnicity. By the end of the century, the cities of the Southwest had experienced a fundamental social and spatial reconstruction that was significantly impacted by Latinas/os.

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Sprawl, in which cities consumed massive tracts of open space, characterized recent urbanization patterns, furthering the contradictions of deconcentration that began in the 1950s (Harvey 1985; Tabb and Sawers 1984). Las Vegas symbolized this expansive, explosive growth in which the desert was transformed into subdivisions at a rate higher than any other location in the nation (Gottdiener et al. 1999). Boosterism, a compliant local state, cheap land, and an intense period of real estate development created the conditions for irrationally rapid growth. The consequences were and still remain overcrowded schools, inadequate transportation systems, environmental degradation, uneven development, and a fragmented civic culture (Gottdiener et al. 1999). The city’s bureaucratic leadership was intertwined with the development community, creating ethical conflicts and a compliant approval process where personal economic interests (Gottdiener et al. 1999) obliterated the planning function. Las Vegas’ unprecedented urbanization is a harbinger of the pending environmental and fiscal crises that will confront the cities of the Southwest in the next quarter century. Moreno Valley, another city in Riverside County, California, was a 1980s pre-cursor to this phenomenal urban growth in an environmentally fragile and excessively energydependent location. In a rural desert zone east of the city of Riverside, this community of approximately 12,000 increased its population, starting in 1980, by the incredible estimated rate of 1,000 per month (Tranquada 1988). By the end of the decade the city’s populace was over 90,000. “I hear people using it as the classic example of topsy-turvy growth and development that takes place at such a rapid rate that it can’t be properly planned and serviced…I hear people talking about it as a future urban slum where developers ran wild,” stated environmentalist Bill Havert (Tranquada 1988). In fact, that is what happened. The school system operated out of portable buildings that, by 1988, required 353 relocatable units (equal to ten elementary schools). The overcrowding crisis led a pro-development city to beg the Building Industry Association to adopt a voluntary moratorium on housing construction (Nelson 1988). Moreno Valley based its city finances as a civic Ponzi scheme. Totally reliant on building fees to finance operations, the city’s fiscal solvency collapsed during the regional real estate depression of the early 1990s. Ironically, Moreno Valley functioned as an “affordable suburb” for working-class minorities priced out of Los Angeles and Orange County housing markets. Offering large homes at reasonable prices, housing poor families readily located forty to seventy miles from their workplace to achieve the dream of home ownership. The congestion in Southern California was awful, and many residents of Moreno Valley and other outer ring zones suffered intolerable two- to three-hour one-way commutes. Eventually, the commute, the lack of infrastructure, and poor quality schools produced a real estate collapse. Many home owners, facing both declining value (due mainly to a declining personal quality of life) and horrendous commutes, simply walked away from their mortgages. The Moreno Valley dream collapsed. Numerous Chicana/o households suffered from this out-migration, both those who lost their equity and credit and those who remained, since their land value had severely declined due to the numerous bankruptcies that plagued the city. If the Las Vegas economy suffers a major economic recession then revisiting the history of Moreno Valley would be prescriptive for that city’s civic elite.

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The intense speculative urban development characteristic of the Southwest has inherent contradictions. While offering affordable home ownership, newer suburbs situated significant distances from employment centers suffer from a number of problems: psychological stress, massive regional peak hour congestion, destruction of rural and/or desert habitat, regional air pollution, a lack of basic local infrastructure and amenities, overcrowded schools, and uneven growth patterns. Numerous local governments face problems related to the taxation and revenues required to support urban service delivery systems. Local financial stability is often predicated on constant growth. When recessionary periods emerge, either in relation to the real estate market or the regional economy, Southwest cities suffer traumatic fiscal shock. Moreno Valley sent pink slips to a third of its bureaucrats in the early 1990s. Las Vegas is highly dependent on gambling and tourism. The city’s financial structure is at the mercy of these economic forces, which, if dramatically restructured, will confront a fate similar to that of Moreno Valley. This type of bust and boom “fiscal planning” places social and urban policy at further risk. Barrio revitalization places additional pressures on limited resources when speculative city building is dependent on cyclical market conditions. Thus, the substantial urbanization that has occurred since 1980 presents a series of policy challenges in which uneven development and structural decline are ignored in the constant quest for growth (Logan and Molotch 1987).

Mapping Chicana/o Urbanism The following analysis of the urbanization patterns of selected cities and/or subregions of the Southwest document both a period of sustained growth and the significant impact of Chicanas/os on spatial relations in the region. Six cities—Albuquerque, Denver, Los Angeles, Phoenix, San Antonio, and San Jose—will form the basis for an explanation of the magnitude of how Latina/o urbanism has impacted the spatial relations of the Southwest during what should be considered a forty-year period. (The demographic change that started in the 1960s is first reflected in the 1970 census data.) The 2000 census data, of which comprehensive data sets are generally available, include post-2000 material that offers a perspective for the future through 2010. These six cities are similar in both the irrational form of urban growth characterizing the larger region and the way that Chicanas/os in particular have influenced Southwest urbanism during the past two decades. Three census periods—1970, 1980, and 2000—provide the requisite information for mapping the impact of Chicana/o urbanism in the Southwest. The 1970 census will serve as the primary platform of assessment for two reasons: it was the first census that attempted to comprehensively count Chicanas/os and Latinas/os in the United States, and it clearly shows the isolation of this community in space. This analysis will not address the gross mistakes and problematic methodology in relation to the census process (a persistent problem with the Census Bureau). What the 1970 census provides is an indication of where Chicanas/os existed in space at the terminus of a historical period in which they were a distinct minority in most major cities (and, with the exception of San Antonio and El Paso, did not approach 50 percent of the populace). The data indicate only limited spatial influence of this populace. The spatial reality was of an ethnic group

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situated in highly segregated zones, with only minimal representation on a regional scale. What is important is a comprehension of the system of highly concentrated barrio zones juxtaposed with wide swaths of space where few Chicanas/os resided. This first comprehensive portrayal clearly exposes the apartheid logic that governed spatial distribution throughout the first seven decades of the past century in all major cities in the Southwest. The following two censuses, 1980 and 2000, were selected to assess the total transformation of Latina/o urbanism in this region. The 1980 census in particular offers an indication of the pending demographic transformation, a sign of the future. While the 1990 census is informative of this transition, it is within the 1980 census that the current era was predicated. By 1980 the pervasive racism in real estate and banking had dissipated somewhat, thus opening suburbia up to what was rapidly evolving into the new majority of the South-west. These data clearly indicate a distinct change in the ethnic composition of suburbia. This census also provides a view of the significant expansion of urban form in all major cities of the region. Sprawl, whether hypothesized by the Los Angeles perspective, human ecologists, regime theorists, or political economists, signifies Southwest urbanization into the current period. The 1980 data constitute the first specific index of how this transformation was actually manifesting itself and of the initial demographic changes that would eventually lead to the establishment of the Chicano city in three specific locations—San Antonio, El Paso, and especially Los Angeles. The 2000 census crystallizes the significant ethnic transition that has reconstructed Southwestern cities. The Southwest has experienced an unprecedented demographic transformation in which one ethnic group has significantly impacted urban growth and desegregation on a monumental regional scale. No other region of the country has experienced the demographic impact of a single ethnic group in relation to urban form that has occurred in the Southwest during the past thirty years. In numerous small and mid-sized cities, Latinas/os now constitute the majority or are a significant minority on a trajectory to majority status (Guzman 2001). East L.A. exhibited the highest concentration of Chicanas/os, 96.8 percent, of any zone in the nation (Guzman 2001). California is at the vanguard of how one ethnic group, which constituted a small percentage of the population in 1960, has transitioned into the largest ethnic group and which in the next five years will be the state’s majority ethnic population. This has a distinct and fundamental urban influence. California and Texas now account for approximately 60 percent of the region’s Latina/o population. New Mexico, with 42.1 percent, has the highest total percentage of any state (Guzman 2001). It is estimated that California will be a majority Latina/o state within a decade. However, California is not unique—all urban locations in the region are experiencing the duality of constant growth and an expansion of the Latina/o populace. In fact, this ethnic community is the most dynamic in relation to cities throughout the nation (Davis 2000). Latina/o urbanism is in reality the new urbanism in the United States. The cultural impact of el barrio has superseded its historic center and is at the precipice of influencing urban society more broadly. This recent history of the intersection of Chicana/o and Southwest urbanism will inform urban policy in the early twenty-first century.

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The Spatial Location of Chicanas/os in 1970 This section will focus on four cities—Albuquerque, Denver, Los Angeles, and San Antonio—representative of both the spatial concentration of Chicanas/os and the effectiveness of segregated urban social relations that had existed through the early 1970s. Historically, Los Angeles and San Antonio had a substantial minority population, whereas Albuquerque and Denver had significantly smaller barrios and a smaller population of Latinas/os. The maps contain both city boundaries and relevant adjacent census tracts (also see maps in the appendix). Thus, the zones will be addressed in terms of metropolitan demographic transition. Chicanas/os in Albuquerque and Denver resided mainly directly west of the civic center. While Denver has historically contained barrios in different areas surrounding the city center, the West Side barrio had the highest residential concentration and the strongest business district (Map 2.a). A few zones northwest of the city also had some Chicanas/os in newly emerging zones of integration. Albuquerque barrios were generally located west, directly adjacent to the civic center. There existed a network of barrios, creating a Chicana/o urban zone in this general vicinity (Map 1.a). There were a few census tracts that were predominately Chicana/o, and one neighborhood, Barelas, functioned as the center of cultural and business activity. The 1970 census indicated an expanding representation in the west and southwest quadrants of the city. Migration northwest of the city was very limited during this period. Both cities had relatively few census tracts with a populace of over 80 percent Chicana/o. A majority of census tracts with significant Chicana/o population ranged between 40 to 80 percent, and they were concentrated in the western sectors of both cities. Denver, in particular, had a low percentage of Chicanas/os in relation to other major Southwest cities throughout this era. The significant minority presence in Albuquerque reflected the importance of Chicanas/os in New Mexico’s history. Los Angeles and San Antonio were substantially different. Both cities had developed significant barrios earlier in the century. San Antonio, along with El Paso, was a minority-majority city in relation to ethnic composition. In the early 1900s, San Antonio was considered the cultural capital of Chicanas/os in the Southwest. Los Angeles, with a substantially higher number of Chicanas/os, exhibited the distinct ethnic stratification associated with residential apartheid. Through 1970 there were immense zones in each city that were completely devoid of Chicanas/os. While the map of Los Angeles (Map 5.a) is of the entire county, it clearly indicates a substantial level of “zones of exclusion.” In San Antonio, the northern and eastern sectors also mirrored this exclusionary characteristic of Los Angeles.

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Map 1.a

Map 2.a

By 1970 San Antonio’s west and south sides had a substantial number of census tracts with high levels of Chicana/o concentration. The south, southwest, and especially the western quadrants of the city were predominantly minority (Map 5.a). This urban history, established in the 1800s, reflected the characteristics of the Chicana/o city. The barrios in these areas were dominated by an urban culture that influenced economic, social, and cultural relations. This period also exhibited indicators of future suburban migration patterns. Chicanas/os had initiated an out-migration into eastern and northeastern outerring suburbs and, to a limited extent, into the developing zones north of the civic center. In Los Angeles, the historically and geographically significant East L.A. barrio had effectively become an internal city, with working-class suburbs extending directly east and southeast into unincorporated parts of Los Angeles County and independent suburbs (Map 3.a). This unprecedented Latina/o urban geography (although difficult to assess in one map) extended approximately twenty miles west to east and five miles north to south, with some subregional nuances. Barrios also existed in the northeast San Fernando Valley, in Long Beach (to the south), and in the southern sectors of the San Gabriel Valley (east). There were intermittent census tracts with a smaller Chicana/o population

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in a few other areas. However, in 1970, other than on the Greater Eastside, barrios remained highly segregated enclaves.

Map 5.a

Map 3.a

A visitor could traverse almost twenty miles of East L.A. and remain within the contours of a Chicana/o city. Extending from the Los Angeles river eastward through a part of Los Angeles County and two cities, Montebello and Pico Rivera, the predominant urban characteristic was an uninterrupted Chicana/o urban geography. The 1970 census data are also informative in relation to a pending migration directly south, into independent working-class suburbs, and into the eastern suburbs of Los Angeles County. Other than East L.A., however, Chicanas/os were isolated in space and sequestered in a limited zone of the county up through that period.

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The Spatial Location of Chicanas/os in 1980 The 1980 census is most informative about the impact of Chicanas/os on actual urban form at that time and the way that the significant demographic transition would influence urban social relations and Chicana/o urbanism in the years to come. The 1980 data clearly offer a portrait of the future in which, for the first time on a massive level, Chicanas/os would migrate from segregated zones of the city into disparate suburbs— inner- and outer-ring—and into middle-class zones in city centers. The 1990 census only serves to validate these early migration patterns, which would fundamentally shape urban social relations and sprawl by 2000. The 1980 maps should be considered the urban and ethnic blueprint of the future. The stunning breadth of migration—a product of civil rights legislation, demographic expansion, and industrial relocation—within a ten-year period placed the entire Southwest on the brink of a new era. The analysis of the 1980 census data focuses on San Jose, Phoenix, Los Angeles, and San Antonio. These cities all featured the new trend of outmigration from concentrated Chicana/o barrios and zones into a previously exclusionary white suburbia. Phoenix and San Jose had smaller percentages of Chicanas/os per total population than the other cities through that period (refer to Table A.3 in the appendix). A clear point of departure for Chicana/o urbanism in San Antonio and Los Angeles occurred in 1980. In both cities, ethnic migration into virtually all sectors of the city had already occurred. While some zones had modest or minimal representation, Chicanas/os were highly mobile in both regions. In addition, the significant expansion of barrios had effectively transformed several zones into the two largest Chicana/o cities in the United States. By 1980 Chicanas/os had migrated into most census tracts within the central city in San Jose (Map 6.b). The barrios were situated north and northeast of the civic center. The entire eastern zone contained moderate to high minority concentrations. However, the western suburbs had very low percentages. Only those census tracts directly adjacent to the city center had significant representation, and this dramatically declined in the outer ring western sector. One relatively rural census tract in the north, and to a lesser degree other semirural zones in the south, exhibited a limited level of out-migration from the urban center. Phoenix’s historic barrios were located directly south of the civic center, either adjacent to or a modest distance from this zone (Map 4.b). This census indicates a continued concentration in these areas, with the exception of a major barrio that was demolished due to airport expansion. Chicanas/os increased their percentage in census tracts south surrounding the civic center, expanded into other southern suburbs, increased migration to western zones, and had a minimal influence in a few areas in the northwest quadrant of the city. Conversely, in the southeastern sector from 1970 to 1980, this population decreased. Phoenix is one city in which census data are not indicative of the substantial demographic transformation occurring in other major cities at this time. Similar to San Jose, there were significant zones—in particular the north and southeast— that had very low representation. In fact, the entire northern quadrant of this city was a defacto segregated Euro-American zone. San Antonio’s entire urban center had transitioned into a predominately Chicana/o geography by this period. The entire west side had significantly expanded into a massive

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barrio. The south side also exhibited a substantial increase in predominantly Chicana/o census tracts. Sectors directly east of the civic center also experienced a significant demographic transition (Map 5.b) Thus, the city that had historically maintained a very high percentage of Chicanas/os had experienced a constant growth in this ethnic group. It was the only major city with a majority minority in the region.

Map 6.b

Map 4.b

In addition, out-migration to outer ring suburbs was also occurring. In particular, the southern and eastern suburbs were experiencing in-migration patterns. Census tracts directly north of the civic center were also being impacted. Only northern suburbs in the outer ring and some eastern zones had low or very low percentages of Chicanas/os. There was limited migration into far northeast and northwest suburbs. In the southern outer ring suburbs, all census tracts showed a significant increase in Chicana/o population. Los Angeles city and county was the first in the region to experience the first major out-migration from dense urban barrios. The eastern San Gabriel Valley and the southeast sector of the county were significantly impacted by Chicana/o growth and migration

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patterns (Map 3.b). The Chicana/o zone of geographic influence extended almost thirty miles, from East L.A., through cities directly east, into the southern sector of the San Gabriel Valley and into working-class suburbs in the center of the Valley. The southeast zone of Los Angeles County and the northeast San Fernando Valley were experiencing a substantial ethnic transformation as well. Numerous blue-collar communities that were historically Euro-American now entered a period of rapid ethnic transition. These zones, in close proximity to the major barrio and manufacturing employment centers in this area, absorbed a “spill-over effect,” the result of overcrowded housing in East L.A. The City of Commerce, the most polluted city in the United States (Boone and Modarres 1999), is within this area of expanding Chicana/o urbanization patterns. Two other notable factors are apparent from the 1980 data: a significant in-migration into South Central Los Angeles, which prior to this period was predominantly AfroAmerican, and a slight trace of an increase into exclusionary suburbs in the west and central San Fernando Valley. In addition, dense immigrant census tracts directly west of the civic center were experiencing the first influx of Central American political and economic refugees, who would initiate a transformation of this area within a decade.

Map 5.b

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Map 3.b

Thus, at this juncture, in both San Antonio and Los Angeles, the future was apparent. Chicana/o urban patterns now controlled substantial urban geographies and were on the verge of dominating major regions of their respective cities.

The Spatial Location of Chicanas/os in 2000 The new millennium projects a continued, and substantial expansion of Chicana/o urbanism in the Southwest. All six cities offer evidence of structural demographic change and accelerating urban sprawl. In essence, urban expansion in this region is integrally interconnected with minority demographic growth rates. Other cities—Houston, San Diego, El Paso, Tucson, Dallas-Fort Worth, Oakland, Santa Fe, Fresno, the Inland Empire in Southern California and Sacramento—exhibit similar socio-demographic characteristics and changes in urban form. In addition, an analysis of small and mid-sized cities undergoing similar changes would possibly offer a unique perspective, presently absent in conventional planning literature, on the comprehensive nature of regional ethnic transformation. All six cities are examples of the ethnic migration into the outer rings of suburbia. In mapping this conjunction of demographic and geographic transformation of the cities of the Southwest, urban policy and planning are being restructured de jure by the expansion of a single ethnic populace. This last set of maps crystallizes how key issues and debates—the Civil Rights movement, judicial battles, demands for educational parity, employment discrimination, and racist resistance—have been socially renegotiated in space. They also clearly reflect the bifurcation of Chicanas/os, and these class divisions will influence urban policy in the multiethnic city of the present and the future. Phoenix has experienced the most significant increase in Chicana/o population expansion in the entire region. Between 1980 and 2000, this ethnic community grew by 132 percent (Table A.2), an astounding percentage increase of 285.4 percent (Table A.4) in twenty years. The census indicates how Chicanas/os have consolidated spatial control

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in the entire southern sector of the city, have significantly increased migration into western suburbs, have ringed the eastern early zones directly adjacent to the civic center, and are currently integrating northwestern suburbs (Map 4.c). The only remaining zone, the north and northeastern suburbs, has yet to experience significant demographic change. If the accelerated demographic expansion that has occurred since the mid-1980s continues, Phoenix’s entire central city will be predominately Chicana/o, and the southern, eastern, and western suburbs will be majority minority. Because of this phenomenal period of demographic transformation, this city may join the group of cities with a majority Chicana/o populace within fifteen years. Albuquerque and Denver are similar in some respects to Phoenix. Both cities have high impact census tracts in the west and southwest zones of the metropolitan area, and feature strong barrio formation directly adjacent to the civic center on the western boundary of this zone. They also saw a north-to-south migration into suburbia in the entire western sector of the urban subregion (Map 1.c and Map 2.c).

Map 4.c

The major difference between these cities is that Denver has major barrios that surround the city and suburban out-migration into eastern outer ring suburbs. Albuquerque has seen a significant increase in migration to southern suburbs, which in Denver remain predominately Euro-American. The Chicana/o population of Denver, for most of past century, was smaller in percentage than other major cities in the region. The percentage has gradually increased to 31.6 percent (Table A.3-see appendix). In both cities, barrios directly west of the civic center transitioned into significant Chicana/oinfluenced suburban zones in the north, northwest, west, and southwest outer ring suburbs. San Jose is an important subregional city with historic barrios interspersed in the urban center. Located at the southern end of San Francisco Bay, this city served as a regional banking and warehousing center for agriculture and manufacturing. The city has been significantly impacted by the technology-driven economic phenomenon of Silicon Valley. Chicanas/os now dominate the central city, in particular an east-to-west zone in the middle of the metropolitan area (Map 6.c). In addition, a semirural zone north of the civic center has

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Map 1.c

Map 2.c

transitioned into a significant area of Chicana/o influence. Other areas that have been impacted are outer ring southern suburbs and older suburbs ringing the civic center. The southern sector, historically a rural agricultural area, is in the process of following the urban pattern of the city, which has consistently urbanized these types of zones since the 1960s. The central city will continue to experience a high concentration of minority census tracts and migration into affordable suburbs. This city’s growth has been directly impacted by a staggering real estate appreciation due to the economic expansion of Silicon Valley. The crisis of affordable housing is a key factor in the growth of Chicana/o zones of influence during the past twenty years. San Antonio and Los Angeles (along with El Paso) are cities in which Chicana/o urbanism has matured and continued to transform these cities into places with significant zones of minority spatial control. San Antonio’s inner city and in particular the western and southern quadrants constitute a Chicana/o city. One of only two cities with an ethnic

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majority in the Southwest, Chicana/o urban patterns in this cultural center offer urban analysts a vision of the future. While numerous major cities are in a stage approaching Chicana/o majority status, including Los Angeles, the urban transition of San Antonio (with the exception of El Paso) is unprecedented. Currently all outer ring suburbs are experiencing strong in-migration, with southern suburbs exhibiting the highest level of demographic change. Outer ring suburbs in the north and west are also in a period of transition, which, if current growth patterns continue, will constitute a “total” Chicana/o city—suburbs, urban barrios, working-class suburbs, and selected outer-ring zones—in the 2010 census.

Map 6.c

Map 5.c

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Attempting to comprehensively visualize Los Angeles County on a page is always problematic (Map 3.c). The census offers a dramatic portrait of how Chicana/o urbanism has transformed both the city and the county. Although the demographic data is correlated only to the city of Los Angeles, the expansion from East L.A. has structurally transformed the ethnic image of the entire county. In fact, if the Inland Empire is incorporated (the far west sectors of San Bernardino and Riverside Counties), the extent of eastern suburban migration would indicate an approximate fifty-mile zone of influence. Five distinct subsectors of Los Angeles County display substantial Chicana/o urban geographies: East L.A.; the central San Gabriel Valley; barrios ringing the civic center from South Central, Pico Union (west), Echo Park, and Highland Park (north); the northeast San Fernando Valley; and suburban cities in southeast Los Angeles County. East L.A. has transcended its urban history and has reformulated the ethnic geography of L.A., becoming what Valle and Torres have termed the Greater Eastside. This massive urban barrio formation is a twenty-mile zone reaching from the Los Angeles River through working-class suburbs and continuing east into the central San Gabriel Valley. This is the largest uninterrupted Chicana/o urban formation in the nation. There is no comparative Chicana/o urban form. From the historic center of Chicana/o urbanism, the entire region has experienced an unprecedented period of demographic transformation. The three main factors leading directly to this polynucleated system of barrios are native births, constant (historic) migration from Mexico, and the influx of economic and political refugees from Central America. Led by Los Angeles, the entire county will also soon transition into a region in which Chicanas/os will be the largest ethnic group, followed by Euro-Americans. Asians are the fastest growing ethnic community in the current period. In less than a decade the entire urban center of the Los Angeles region will merge with East L.A. into a zone of cultural influence, only presently surpassed by Mexico City and Guadalajara in North America, in relation to Latina/o urban cultural and spatial dominance. Two suburban zones, the San Gabriel Valley (east) and the San Fernando Valley (northwest), will have Chicana/o ethnic majorities. South Central Los Angeles will also become majority Chicana/o, a return to its initial ethnic character prior to the significant migration of Afro-Americans into California during the period between 1930 and 1960. The latest census serves to reaffirm the central importance and influence of Chicana/o urbanism in both California and the Southwest.

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Map 3.c

A Brief Assessment of Demographic Transformation in Selected Cities in the Southwest From 1980 to 2000, the Chicana/o populace in the cities analyzed here expanded at a higher rate than the general population (Table A.2-see appendix). The only exception was San Antonio in the 1990s, in which Chicana/o growth rates paralleled the city’s rate. Phoenix exhibited a significant increase in both the percentage of Chicanas/os and the expansion of this ethnic community during this twenty-year period. Between 1990 and 2000 the percentage change within the Chicana/o populace was 132 percent (Table A.2). The total percentage increase between 1980 and 2000 was 285.4 percent (Table A.4-see appendix). This level of ethnic transformation was greater than in any major city in the region through the past quarter century. Three other cities exhibited significant Chicana/o population increases in this timeframe: Los Angeles at 110.6 percent, San Jose at 92.1 percent, and Denver 90.2 percent (Table A.4). San Antonio experienced a 59.1 percent increase, similar to Albuquerque’s 59.7 percent increase (Table A.4). Five of the six cities experienced constant Chicana/o population growth (Table A.3). Albuquerque and San Antonio exhibited the lowest rates of percentage increase relative to the entire city. Denver and San Jose had gradual growth, although neither city expanded at a high rate. Phoenix and Los Angeles saw dramatic growth. In 1980, Chicanas/os constituted 27.5 percent of Los Angeles. Twenty years later they were 46.5 percent, irrespective of undercount issues endemic to that city (Table A.3). Phoenix’s percentage change was just as significant, from 14.7 percent in 1980 to 34 percent in 2000. Every city featured higher constant growth among Chicanas/os than the total population, with one exception. In only one decade (1990–2000), San Antonio’s total

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population and its Chicana/o growth rates were virtually the same, 36.4 percent and 36.3 percent (Table A.2). The political history of Denver accounts for one statistical anomaly. In the early era of desegregation, the counties surrounding the city vehemently opposed linkages to Denver’s public school system. The Poundstone Amendment, adopted by the state legislature in 1974, forbade any future annexation efforts by the city (Clarke and Saiz 2003). This led to a decrease in total population between 1980 and 1990. This is the only period of decline in population among the six cities analyzed. In the 1990s Phoenix far surpassed all other cities in Chicana/o growth rates and had the highest percentage total population growth rate of that decade. Ironically, Los Angeles experienced a very small population growth rate, 6 percent, as indicated in the 2000 census. Phoenix had the highest rate of Chicana/o population growth at 132 percent, followed by Denver at 63.2 percent, Albuquerque at 40.1 percent, San Antonio at 36.3 percent, and San Jose at 32.7 percent (Table A.2). Los Angeles’ 23.5 percent increase in Latinas/os between 1990 and 2000 was not insignificant, especially in relation to the total Latina/o population increase of 327,000 people. Clearly, the prognosticators who projected this demographic transformation four decades ago were relatively accurate. The gradual Chicana/o and Latina/o population expansion had, by the late 1980s, shifted into a rapid surge in the 1990s. Thus, extrapolating from Table A.3, a number of major and mid-sized cities in the Southwest will be either majority Chicana/o or cities in which Chicanas/os constitute the largest ethnic group by 2010.

Santa Ana, California: The Explosion One city is indicative of the social and cultural transformation of the cities of the Southwest. Located in the center of a conservative region of California, Orange County (Kling et al. 1991), is the city of Santa Ana. Through the early and mid-century, most cities in this county were particularly inhospitable to Chicanas/os. Although the economy was structurally based on agriculture and dependent on a low-wage labor force, social repression and control over minorities were embedded in regional culture. When rapid suburbanization started in the late 1960s, the regional economy restructured into real estate, banking, tourism (led by Disneyland), services, retail, and limited industrial development. This required an urban-oriented, low-wage labor force. A major problem, which persists in the current era, is an acute lack of affordable housing for working-class households. Orange County is one of the highest per capita income regions in the nation and consistently maintains high land and housing costs relative to the broader Southern California market (Kling et al. 1991). It was also very exclusionary. Thus, Chicana/o working-class households were, by the 1970s, trapped between two urban policy vices: racism and high living costs. Most cities refused to either increase densities in selected locations or address the affordability crisis. Police harassment, employment discrimination, racism in commercial zones, and low wages placed constant pressure on Chicanas/os in the region. By the late 1970s, Santa Ana, which had the county’s largest inventory of apartments (a substantial percentage built before 1965), functioned as the de facto “low cost housing reservoir” for minorities in the county. A number of small neighborhoods rapidly became micro barrios in the center of a

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hostile social environment. Small businesses focusing on the minority and immigrant consumer base also emerged. During the 1980s, Santa Ana experienced a rapid demographic transformation. Between 1980 and 1990 the Chicana/o populace increased by 111 percent and now constituted 65.1 percent of the city (Table A.5-see appendix). This populace increased by 34.3 percent by 2000 and now constituted 76.1 percent of the city (Guzman 2001). The city’s total population increased by 44.2 percent between 1980 and 1990 and only 14.9 percent in the next decade. Conversely, the Chicana/o population increase during this twenty-year period was 183.6 percent (Table A.5). The total Chicana/o population increase was actually higher than the total population increase between 1980 and 2000, (166, 451 [Chicana/o] versus 134,057 [total city]) (Guzman 2001). Obviously, some of the difference is attributable to Euro-American flight from Santa Ana. However, the growth rate is also correlated to the “affordable” (a relative concept in Orange County) housing in this older city. Literally, in less than twenty years Santa Ana became one of the ten cities with the highest percentage Latina/o in the United States (Guzman 2001). Only East L.A. represented a higher percentage in California. In the middle of a mostly white suburbia, within one of the most reactionary areas of the Southwest, Chicana/o urbanism created a new, major barrio of over 250,000 gente.

Conclusion Latina/o urbanism was a key force in creating the multiethnic city and fostering multiculturalism within civic society. The cities of the Southwest at the end of the millennium had finally initiated a historical process to supersede their own racist histories and finally acknowledge the centrality of el barrio in relation to urban policy. The ideology of the American dream, reified in a highly segregated suburbia, had been undermined by the civil rights struggles and the social electricity of minority empowerment of the 1960s. The social construction of what constituted civil society—defense of segregation, state repression in all of its manifestations (bureaucratic, police, and political)—were outmaneuvered by the new users of space—Chicanas/os, Mexicanas/os, Central Americans, and immigrants. Reclaiming space in their own vision, a transformative Latina/o socio-cultural regime had fundamentally altered the entire Southwest region. There is no turning back. The project of minority ascendancy, vehemently resisted and repressed through most of the past century, spatially sequestered in segregated barrios, socially controlled in courts and prisons, economically disenfranchised by noneducational systems and low-wage injustice, structurally and spatially destroyed through directed mismanagement of public policy and domineered by racist urban cartels in defense of the central organizing feature of this society, banking institutions that drained generations of the meager earnings through redlining and secondary circuits of lending, and ultimately the constant attack on identity, succeeded only because of an intense resistance in the self-contained socio-cultural, spatially centered location of el barrio. From that critically influential space, confronted by decades of public and urban policy designed to destroy both the physical and cultural integrity of that location, a new society has emerged.

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That society has only in the past fifteen years engaged in a grand multiethnic experience. Only one major city in the Southwest lends a vision of that future: San Francisco. It is a location not without its own social and political blemishes, historical embarrassments, contradictory logics, and spatial complexities. However, of all the cities in this region, this city during the past forty years has maintained a cultural maturity, a social acknowledgment of difference and an acceptance of the ethnic other. It has also engaged in self-reflexive controversies over gender and sexual preference, the affordable city, community empowerment, youth in society, care for the disadvantaged and disenfranchised, individual rights and, specifically, the celebration of culture and the city. Los Angeles in particular and the Southwest in general still have yet to achieve that urban spatial and cultural maturity. The repressive and regressive complexities of regional social history, initially hidden in barrio socio-spatial relations will, hopefully, permanently end. The demographic transformation is in the middle of a stage in which the trajectory of the Chicana/o city is leading directly to a regional influence and potential that previous generations wistfully dreamed about, while simultaneously having those dreams crushed by urban policy cartels, a colonial labor system, and structural discrimination. That history, a legacy yet to be fully excavated in the Southwest, is centered on spatial relations, planning, public and urban policy, and the city. In the following sections, the influence of Chicanas/os and Latinas/os in space, the centrality of barrio spatial relations, planning, urban policy, and the politics of planning will be explored to explain the new socio-cultural reality of the cities of the Southwest that the 2000 census maps and statistics show. The desegregated city did not just appear on paper, in data from a survey, or only a few years ago. Its history—urban, spatial, and cultural—was established in barrios and colonias in the Southwest over a century ago. That essential spatial center has led, through a depressingly long social winter, to the urbanization patterning of the multiethnic city. It emanated from the early evolution of the Chicana/o city and is now represented in the new cities of the Southwest. Ironically, planning and urban policy has yet to arrive at its future destination in this region.

PART II Major Urban Issues and the Chicana/o Community

5 Housing Policy and the Crisis of Affordability in the Southwest The structural condition and the character of housing in Chicana/o neighborhoods are correlated with local implementation of federal housing programs, planning and code enforcement policies, and real estate and banking industry practices in lower-income areas. The demand for affordable housing has been (and continues to be) a prominent issue in barrios and lower-income neighborhoods throughout the United States (Shannon et al. 1997, 137–9; Myers et al. 1996; Rosen and Dienstfrey 1999). Barrios continue to suffer from substantial deterioration, real estate speculation, a high percentage of renters, and underinvestment from both the private and public sectors. Although most of those living in barrios are renters, there are sectors of the populace who opt for long-term home ownership. Home purchases are made at minimum stabilized land value, albeit at the lowest echelon of regional housing markets. Chicana/o communities are characterized by overcrowded housing, lack of local government reinvestment, limited infrastructure rehabilitation, and conflicting zoning codes. These neighborhoods contain a range of housing types including single family dwellings, duplexes, small scale bungalow apartments, large apartment complexes, and mixed-use structures. This type of mixed housing, which dates from the 1920s, was established through city zoning policies and predicated upon an expected rise in property values (Delafons 1969; Nelson 1977). Many early suburbs were zoned R-2 or R-3, a policy that resulted in a streetscape with an eclectic mix of scale, architecture, housing condition, and density. Many apartments were constructed without adequate parking or social space. These are some of the challenges faced by local housing programs and community-based organizations involved in the development of small-scale projects for low-income housing (Simon 2001; Ellen et al. 2002). Since 1980, a bifurcation of housing demands has occurred in Chicana/o communities: an out-migration to suburban areas and an expanding renter class in traditional barrios and colonias. The move toward the suburbs coincides with a rise in income level influenced by affirmative action and increased access to colleges. Although this pattern reflects conventional urban residential dispersion patterns of the post-World War II era, Chicana/o migration was stunted until the 1960s. At this time, federal legislation began to address issues of regressive redlining, racism in housing opportunity, discriminatory employment policy, and cultural maturity within Euro-American society. Social progress became particularly evident in the Southwest, where a number of cities underwent a significant change in the ethnic composition of their suburbs (Davis 2000; Thomas and Murray 1991; James et al. 1984; Suro and Singer 2002). The evolving demand for middle-class housing, improved amenities, and locational preferences set the course for the future direction in housing policy in this region.

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In this present time of globalization and transmigration of labor (Sassen 1991), the Latina/o populace has entered into a new era of migration throughout the United States. This universality of migration indicates that affordable housing policy addressing this community is national—not regional. Latina/o neighborhoods are developing in the South and Midwest in response to the agriculture industries’ demand for cheap labor and decentralized manufacturing in rural America (Murphy et al. 2001). As in the tourist, restaurant, and small manufacturing sectors of California, South Florida, and New York, a small army of immigrant labor with significant representation by Mexicanas/os and Chicanas/os is finding service jobs in the office buildings, kitchens, and hotels of Southwestern cities (Gonzalez-Baker 2001; Zentgraf 2001). Overcrowded, overpriced, and poorly maintained housing situations have spiked the demand for adequate, safe shelter (Gordon and Mayer 1991; Bratt et al. 1986). Thus there are two distinct challenges confronting housing policy at the federal and local levels: a persistent affordability crisis and an increasing demand for housing located beyond the geography of traditional barrios. Access to suburban housing is addressed by the private sector (in terms of constant production) and the government (in terms of antidiscriminatory housing legislation). The movement of middle- and upper-class Chicanas/os into suburbs mirrors the residential sprawl characteristic of major cities in the Sunbelt region, such as Los Angeles, Phoenix, Denver, Albuquerque, San Antonio, Denver (Perry and Watkins, 1977; Bernard and Rice, 1983). Numerous suburbs, including (Pico Rivera, CA; San Antonio’s Northside; Denver’s Thorton, Westminister, and Northglen; Albuquerque’s Princes Jean Park; and Phoenix’s Tempe and Mesa are predominantly Chicana/o or Chicanas/os constitute a significant percentage of the populace. Chicanas/os have not significantly benefited from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)-funded programs and reallocation policies that were initially adopted to address deteriorating residential neighborhoods. Federal revitalization programs have instead been co-opted by local elites for development of civic centers, sports arenas and offices—all of which have had minimal impact on housing and social conditions in barrios (Piven and Cloward 1997, 393–5). President Johnson’s “Great Society” intended to initiate a period of housing and economic revitalization and increased private sector reinvestment, but it did not have this effect on the barrios (Dallek 1998; Kaplan et al. 1970). A number of historical factors, including overt racism, exclusion from the political arena, elite control over land policy, manipulation of federal programs by local political culture (Gillette 1995; Frieden and Kaplan 1975), rationalfunctional planning practice (Forester 1989), and the inability of federal agencies to ensure the transfer of knowledge at the community level (Davidoff 1965; Alexander 1984), negated a proactive reallocation strategy during this period. In fact, the implementation of federal revitalization programs was characterized by massive and abusive destruction of entire neighborhoods without any coinciding benefits to the displaced residents or ethnic business owners (Boyer 1973). Failures to enforce HUD policy, in particular the monitoring of local government implementation strategies, precluded changes that would have shifted the focal point of reinvestment activities. By the 1980s, this bureaucratic neglect and manipulation by local elites became so systemic that virtually no change in either the structural condition of housing or any tangible impact in relation to the supply crisis could occur (Newman and Schnare 1993). The

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post-World War II federal urban policy can only be viewed as a historic lost opportunity in relation to barrios. Also, the focus on homelessness during the mid-1980s overshadowed the fundamental demand for affordable shelter that has occurred over the past fifteen years (Ford 1999). In conjunction with the devastating impact of redlining in minority communities (Squires 1994; Gotham 2002), the lack of realistic attention paid by Euro-Americandominated local governments to the revitalization of declining barrios has resulted in a spiraling deterioration of social and economic conditions in lower-income communities throughout the Southwest. Racist lending practices perpetrated by the banking community have stringently limited the capability of Chicana/o households to achieve a higher percentage of home ownership or to obtain funding to rehabilitate older homes. In regard to a directed strategy of disinvestment in predominately Chicana/o neighborhoods, it is difficult to determine whether the banking industry or local government is more responsible for the legacy of constant decline. With the reconcentration of banking institutions that occurred in response to globalization, the availability and access to capital for lower-income communities is reassuming the characteristics of blatant redlining (Ross and Yinger 2002). Numerous bank branches in minority neighborhoods were shuttered during the 1990s in an effort to shed “under performing” offices (Ross and Yinger 2002). Thus, for barrio residents, home improvement financing is again becoming increasingly costly and difficult to obtain. Community Reinvestment Act provisions related to banking “reform” legislation have had a minuscule influence on protecting barrios from the loss of major banks and access to capital.

Character of Chicana/o Barrios in the United States Constructed in response to the historic racism and discrimination embedded in Southwest culture, barrios evolved around a strong sense of cultural identity and ethnic solidarity. This strong cultural identity and collective consciousness are critical to the establishment of communal solidarity in working-class areas (Laclau and Mouffe 1985; Mouffe 1979, 186; Ruiz 1987). Extremely low household incomes resulting from a dual wage structure and stratified employment practices forced Chicanas/os into the lowest tier of regional housing markets (Barrera 1979; Weber 1994). In addition, racism in housing markets served to cordon Chicanas/os into specified areas of cities. However, the housing issue was not solely based on affordability. A small entrepreneurial class, whose access to suburban areas was previously restricted, has persisted throughout the past century. Civil rights reforms that began to percolate into mainstream culture led to relatively open regional housing markets by the mid-1980s. However, the legacy of racism and reactionary implementation of federal housing programs have contributed to severe deterioration in a vast majority of barrios in the United States (Rosenthal 2002, 127). Chicana/o residential zones are composed of a significant level of renters vis-à-viz homeowners. In relation to the structural crisis in affordable housing, this section will focus attention on lower-income residential areas and land use patterns. Following a normative urban land use pattern that evolved during the modern evolution of American cities, a majority of barrios developed in close proximity to civic centers. The factors

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leading to this type of locational relationship were proximity to employment, access to public transportation, and low-cost housing. A factor leading to barrio underdevelopment was racism in housing opportunity. Discriminatory tactics practiced by Euro-Ameri-cans included bans on home purchases in certain neighborhoods, the refusal to interview potential Chicana/o renters, structural banking industry prohibitions on extending credit, and, occasionally, physical violence against families attempting to integrate into workingclass suburbs. Often this social repression was sanctioned by local authorities and the police (Meyer 2000). Stringently limited housing options served the interests of the real estate industry on two levels. Since opportunities were restricted, strong demand and high rents for lower quality housing remained constant. Second, targeted land speculation correlated with strategic underinvestment in the housing stock. Due to high local demand, families were locked into substandard units. In barrios that had a high percentage of home ownership, real estate speculation negatively impacted the general condition of housing, creating a valuation ceiling that structurally undermined the normative appreciation in land that existed in regional housing markets. Racism, discrimination, and speculation forced Chicanas/os into older housing stock, that is decaying tenements in the early 1900s, and, between 1920 and 1970, declining suburbs. During the early 1900s, a limited number of Chicana/o homeowners built their own homes. These homes were of varying structural quality, especially since code enforcement was not strictly monitored in early urban history (Sanders 1997). Richard Garcia, in documenting housing conditions in San Antonio in the 1930s, showed the dire reality of Southwest urban barrios. He described the houses as “floor less shacks that were overcrowded, without plumbing or sewer connections,” sitting on unpaved streets (Garcia 1978, 31). Because access to capital was difficult, families, irrespective of their size, could only afford to construct relatively small units. Thus, numerous barrios came to be dominated by two-bedroom, one-bath homes that were overcrowded almost as soon as they were finished. In later years, home additions were constructed in an attempt to make homes more livable, resulting in an eclectic structural appearance. In the initial period of city planning (1900–1930), a majority of cities utilized a multizoning dwelling (R-2 or R-3) designation even in low-density residential neighborhoods (Weiss 1987; Toll 1969). City officials pursued a policy of least resistance in generating support for a new era of government control over land use policy. The tradeoff was increased land value allowing for future high-density construction. Most Euro-American residential areas rarely utilized this densification strategy. But, by midcentury in the barrios, absentee landlords and land speculators began tearing down older homes and replacing them with apartments of varying size and scale. Thus, barrios evolved into a distinctly different physical form in relation to the conventional low-scale residential suburb. The streetscapes exhibited a range of housing types: single family (with additions), duplexes, mid-sized apartments that were two (and occasionally three) stories, bungalow units, and a few homes that served neighborhood commercial demands. By 1950, barrios were severely overcrowded (Garcia 2000; Achor 1978; James et al. 1984). Constant population growth and racially based housing restrictions placed inordinate pressure on the structural condition of units, essentially mandating the densification of barrios to meet this demand. The real estate industry had created a market for “cracker-box apartment building(s) catering to immigrants” at the lowest

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echelon of the regional housing market (DiMento and Graymer 1987). However, this value was mainly related to highly profitable ground rents, while actual land and property value remained low. This hindered normal appreciation in value accruing to Chicana/o homeowners—loss of wealth during a period of otherwise unprecedented valuation increases in the regional real estate economy. Local government policy and practice were also major factors in the decomposition of the housing stock in barrios. Three crucial areas of local government action in the 1900s—public works, code enforcement, and landlord abuses—gave minuscule attention to barrios. In relation to infrastructure, cities often ignored poor conditions until the demands of the local economy mandated improvement of the quality of streets. Barrios were the last areas to receive paved streets and alleys. In many cities (large and small) in the current era, some barrios still lack basic infrastructure. The results of this directed under investment by the public sector were deteriorating urban conditions and low property values in selected zones of cities. Code enforcement in barrios is often targeted at homeowners while attention to abusive landlords is left to legal aid societies (Hartman 1974). Code enforcement is a haphazard activity within the framework of local government. However, this does not justify government officials’ tolerance of decaying and deplorable structural conditions that exist in barrios (Wilson 1997; Rosales 2000). Historically, a significant percentage of housing units in slums have always been either substandard or severely deteriorated (Wohl 2002; Wright 1981). Yet, landlords act with impunity in demanding rents without reinvestment in property maintenance. This tendency on the part of landlords reinforces a reality of directed mismanagement in relation to government policy in Chicana/o neighborhoods. This dual relationship between a lack of code enforcement and landlord abuses reenforces a rationale for disinvestment by the real estate and banking industries and is a major factor in the deterioration of lower income communities. Homeowners in barrios generally reflect ownership behavior in the larger metropolitan region. They reinvest in their property, develop attractive gardens, build creative fences, and transfer Mexicano cultural characteristics to porches, outdoor patios, and liveable space (Arreola, 1988). Barrios have always been anchored by a core of working-class homeowners. The last census indicates that a new class of home ownership is emerging, essentially replacing older barrio residents whose children have migrated to suburban areas (Tomas Rivera Policy Institute 2002). In many urban areas, immigrants, predominantly from Mexico and Central America, are gentrifying declining older residential areas and restoring land value. This in turn, has improved structural conditions and the cultural character of barrios. However, the general structural condition of barrios in 2000 remains in a declining state. Despite limited reinvestment and limited increases in home ownership, land speculation and underinvestment have perpetuated underdevelopment. Barrio housing stock normally consists of the oldest units in a region. A significant percentage of current barrio housing was constructed between 1920 and 1940, and much of it exists in varying states of decline. Given that the only objective of a significant number of absentee landlords and land speculators is to extract ground rents, the demand for reinvestment is totally ignored. Many landlords prefer to abandon dilapidated homes rather than invest in rehabilitation activities (Hartman et al. 1982). Another rampant practice perpetrated by

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landlords is to rent single bedrooms and garages to entire families, thus accelerating deterioration in a short timeframe (Hooper and Hamberg 1986). A modest number of units have been constructed since the 1990s. However, most potential homeowners cannot afford the significant costs related to purchasing or building homes. Likewise, credit is unavailable to working-class families situated in the lowest level of the regional workforce. Thus, while new home ownership is an encouraging signal, the abuses of land speculators and state underinvestment complicates the longterm restoration of value in these communities.

The Evolution of Federal Housing Policy between 1930 and 1960 Federal attention to housing and financial assistance for cities evolved at a glacial pace prior to the 1960s. Successive administrations expressed reluctance toward adopting policies that were “local” in focus and beyond the purview of the national government (Bauman 1983; Wilson 1966). The problems of deteriorated, distasteful tenements were a legacy of the industrial era and the expansion of cities at the turn of the century. The real estate industry, consisting of small capital in the regional economy, was an arena with scant government oversight. The separation between the state and the market was maintained until the post-World War II era. Housing legislation of the New Deal, though symbolically significant, had minimal impact during the Depression. The federal role, a response to intense lobbying by major cities, gradually escalated into the 1950s strategy of aggressive slum clearance and creation of public housing developments. Within this new role was a dualistic relationship between purported benefits to slums and overt racist tactics related to local control over federal programs. Public attention to the housing crisis began with demands to reform tenement districts. Led by the female-dominated settlement house movement, activists initiated early housing reforms in the 1880s and 1890s. They focused on decrepit conditions such as poor air circulation, overcrowding, miserable sanitation systems, irregular trash collection, environmentally hazardous living conditions, local building code regulations, and public sanitation issues (Addams 1930). This attention paid by the settlement house leadership to the condition of housing and declining neighborhoods was instrumental in the initial evolution of the city planning profession (Boyer 1983). However, in spite of successfully lobbying cities to adopt basic building codes and direct a limited level of attention toward working-class areas, the movement was ineffective in terms of creating a comprehensive solution to the crisis of affordable, decent shelters. By the 1920s, settlement movement leaders—labeled “housers” due to their tireless advocacy for improving the urban environment—shifted their attention to the national government (Addams 1930). The magnitude of the tenement crisis was beyond the capability of cities to independently resolve it. A number of factors, including sexism, fiscal issues, the weak political power of an immigrant constituency, and a reluctance to involve the federal government in local matters, led to Congress’ unenthusiastic response. A key characteristic of the settlement house movement was tireless and relentless advocacy, a trait reflected by the activism of Edith Elmer Wood, Catherine Bauer, and Mary Simkovitch (Wright 1981, 220–21). All of these women simply refused to accept no for an answer.

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Housers viewed the passage of the National Housing Act in 1934 as a reward for their efforts. This was the first major bill from Congress that specifically contained language directing the government to develop programs to address “slum housing” and to work with cities to address this national problem (Wright 1981). Though the housers declared victory, the real impact of the legislation would not be felt in urban constituencies until the 1950s. The other aspects of the law, which involved requirements for professionally surveyed subdivisions, a new role for the federal government, and guaranteed home mortgages, were deemed the most important provisions. In essence, the federal government, in the midst of the depression, was determined to intervene directly in the real estate market in an attempt to reinvigorate a moribund sector of the economy. The attention to slum housing was incorporated to generate housers’ support for the legislative package. Irrespective of the historic nature of this legislation, the economic devastation of the depression overrode any tangible benefits that occurred during the 1930s. The government did not have sufficient revenues to support the massive intervention required to address the affordability crisis. With the advent of the World War II, domestic policy became moot in relation to allocation of federal funds. The condition of housing in lower-income neighborhoods during the war continued an unabated period of deterioration. City housing stocks, the majority of which were built prior to 1910, remained in use with minimal investment in maintenance. Many apartments and homes did not receive any significant rehabilitation for almost fifty years, a period spanning the latter stages of the crisis of the tenement districts, two world wars, and a Depression. By the mid-1940s, as the war ended, the condition of lower-income housing was in a severe state of decline (deLeeuw et al. 1976). In the middle of a international euphoria over the pending defeat of the German variant of fascism, local leaders began assessing the damage to property values, civic stature, and—more importantly—the sheer cost of rehabilitating their respective cities. A new type of depression stared at local elites: neighborhoods that were figuratively and literally disintegrating (Bauman 1983). These elites recognized that, internally, cities could not afford to address a half century of deterioration. Mayors and civic leaders realized that the only major source of funding to address the urban and housing crisis was to be found in Washington, D.C. The challenge was to convince Congress and the administration that domestic policy and federal intervention in cities had to become a responsibility of the national government. In response, the Congress passed legislation in 1947 reaffirming redevelopment of slums as a national mandate. The legislation gave cities new powers over land in relation to addressing slum housing conditions—the power of eminent domain, in conjunction with financial incentives (Biles 2000; Wilson 1966). In effect, the state assumed a role in the private sector that it had historically shied from in the past (Biles 2000). While the effort was initially tepid, cities initiated an era of giving specific attention to lowerincome neighborhoods. This was accomplished through coordinated planning policies that resulted in slum clearance. Tucson was a key city during this period. Viejo Barrio was a neighborhood within the geography of the city’s civic center, and a prime location for expansionist commercial development. The city destroyed the barrio, leaving a small, inconsequential corridor. The massive displacement that resulted was described as “a disaster for hundreds of families and business owners. For a dime, the city bought up the land and wiped out a

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vibrant community” (Portillo 2002). Tucson’s destruction was also indicative of the below market land pricing that literally robbed Chicanas/os of hundreds of thousands of financial resources—a sordid issue that demands reparations. Plans for airport expansion in Phoenix necessitated the destruction of major barrios directly adjacent to the area. While the community organized an effective opposition (this will be discussed in a subsequent section), the dismantling of Chicana/o neighborhoods became a fait accompli once the city made its initial decision to expand Sky Harbor Airport. In actuality, the city could have relocated the airport to a rural location west of the city or to a suburban city within relative proximity to Phoenix. However, because barrio space was considered expendable, the city proceeded with its plan. This action fractured the community. Without strong solidarity and a sense that their opposition efforts, no matter how strong, would be successful, community leaders were left with only one viable option: negotiate the most lucrative deal for barrio land. Pilot projects funded by the federal government for factory workers in the 1940s also influenced government policy toward production of affordable housing. War-related reindustrialization placed yet another strain on the housing supply. Workers were forced to live in cars, in overcrowded conditions, or in outlying areas. The government funded demonstration projects to encourage the real estate industry to implement new and accelerated methods of building housing (Wright 1981). This eventually resulted in a structural change in the real estate industry. Real estate, carpentry craft, and construction industries worked together to establish housing development companies, effectively consolidating a fractured industry into a relatively cohesive unit oriented toward the production of large-scale, patterned residential developments (Wright 1981; Mayer 1978). This new orientation of the development industry, pioneered by Levittown in Long Island (Wright 1981; Mayer 1978; Hayden 1984), provided impetus in the 1950s for cities with financial support from the national government to address the dual crises of exploding housing demand and slums. Large-scale developments resulted in increased supply, modest pricing, and decentralization of urban systems. With an expanded federal role, the link between Washington, D.C. and large and small cities commenced a new era in the orientation of federal domestic policy. Beginning in the late 1950s, the national government assumed the financial and programmatic vanguard of virtually all urban and housing policy (Rowland 1971). Cities, in rapid fashion, utilized the new powers of redevelopment and eminent domain to address severely deteriorated slums and, to a limited extent, to provide public housing. The era of slum clearance evolved into a particularly painful experience for urban minority communities. Civic elites focused specific attention on these zones when utilizing their redevelopment powers (Harvey 1973; Gottdiener 1985; Darden et al. 1987). Their vision incorporated the destruction of entire, often historic and culturally cohesive, neighborhoods and the replacement of these neighborhoods with new industrial or commercial developments. Since federal redevelopment regulations provided broad latitude to local government, relocation benefits and policies varied significantly across the country. Most cities did not provide relocation subsidies for renters. The only “real” requirement was an eviction notice. Cities rarely reimbursed minority property owners at local fair market value. Utilizing the power of forced property sale and eviction, cities

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forced minorities to accept offers that fell between 50 and 80 percent of their land’s regional market value.

Chavez Ravine and Controversy over Space and Housing Policy Many public housing agencies in the Southwest practiced overt discrimination by giving preference to impoverished Euro-Americans over Chicana/o families. Numerous public housing developments were really “segregated” Euro-American enclaves. In Los Angeles and other cities, community activists fought bitter battles over this inherently racist practice. This civil conflict raged from the late 1940s through the early 1960s (Garcia 1994). Community leaders demanded that public housing authorities end discriminatory and exclusionary practices, increase the supply of public housing, and halt slum clearance that targeted barrios. The political controversy over the fate of an area known as Chavez Ravine is illustrative of the history of political conflict and housing policy in Chicana/o neighborhoods in Los Angeles. Chavez Ravine, established as a haven from racism in Los Angeles, was a tranquil hillside neighborhood located approximately one mile northwest of Los Angeles’ civic center (Normark 1999; Lopez 2002). The geography was characterized by low-lying hills and meadows which isolated the community from the downtown. The community was low scale, consisting of single-family homes interspersed with open space, trees, and grassy knolls. In the late 1940s, the city’s housing agency designated the area for futuristic, high-density public housing development (Lopez 2002; Parson 1993). Local housing activists opposed this project on the basis that Chavez Ravine would need to be destroyed for construction of public housing. Their main points of contention were the discriminatory impact on the neighborhood and the projected high-density development. Since the city council was reluctant to support a substantial financial commitment to what staunch conservatives considered a “socialist” policy of state intervention into the housing market, the issue evolved into a debate over the future of public housing (Parson 2002; Gottlieb and Wolt 1977). After an initial period of trepidation, area residents began to place less focus on the issue; without funding, their community was safe from confiscation by eminent domain powers. Major league baseball and the quest of civic leaders for a sense of symbolic national importance would dramatically change the future of Chavez Ravine in the mid-1950s. When New York officials failed to support Walter O’Malley’s proposal to build a new stadium, the Brooklyn Dodgers threatened to leave the city. Few influential leaders in New York placed any validity on this threat. However, O’Malley was angry with the lack of support and serious about a change in location. He held meetings with Los Angeles officials to consider moving the team to the West Coast (Henderson 1980). The major problem was locating a site with the required acreage, parking, and transportation. City officials decided to fly O’Malley around the city to scout potential locations. Almost immediately, they identified the low-density, picturesque community of Chavez Ravine as a great location. The only problem was that the city had designated the site for affordable housing (Acuna 1996).

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City officials agreed to sell all of Chavez Ravine to Walter O’Malley for what was purported to be a pittance relative to the massive subsidies involved in the housing project. The price was below bargain basement levels—even for that era! In rapid fashion, the city invoked eminent domain powers under redevelopment authority to relocate the remaining original families in the barrio. Initially, due to O’Malley’s demand for secrecy, few people were aware of these negotiations. O’Malley was fearful that New York leaders might convince the National League to prevent him from moving the franchise out of the city. He wanted the deal to be completed prior to a public announcement to the league. Unexpectedly, the residents of Chavez Ravine organized a strong resistance to the looming loss of their homes, social environment, and sense of community (Parson 1993; Lopez 2002). When the plan to sell the land to the Dodgers was leaked to the public, a strong local opposition in support of the residents emerged. A bitter, highly charged public referendum in 1958 ensued (Henderson 1980; Parson 1993), with Chicana/o homeowners openly resisting the city’s demand to sell their property. Many residents refused to adhere to court orders mandating the sale of their property. Numerous residents were forced from their homes by the police (Lopez 2002; Acuna 1996). Many older residents refused to leave. A few armed themselves and challenged state authority to remove them, threatening violence against the police (Gamboa [n.d.]). The regional media covered the later stages of the forced removal; the visual image of abuelitos y abuelitas willing to fight for their property was too tempting for the new medium of television to ignore. Eventually the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) forcibly removed the last individuals and the property was officially ceded to the Dodgers (Lopez 2002). The controversy over Chavez Ravine was a defining political moment in the history of racism against Chicanas/os in Southern California. The city never attempted to construct either the specific type of high-density project or the planned level of public housing units initially planned for Chavez Ravine. The use of eminent domain powers was a thin charade to confiscate land from minority property owners and transfer it to an influential Euro-American elite. This case study is an example of how “affordable housing policy” was manipulated during that era in barrios.

The Regressive Impact of Redlining on Chicanas/os and Suburban Expansion The two eras of suburban expansion, the 1920s and the post-World War II era, had a major regressive characteristic that severely hindered Chicana/o households from attaining home ownership status. Generating sufficient capital was difficult due to stratification of the labor force and a dual wage system that was embedded in the U.S. economy throughout most of the century. Families had to struggle to establish the financial capability to purchase land and/or a home. However, the real problem was prevention of basic access to capital posed by artificial barriers created by major banking corporations. The entire industry internalized a racist system of exclusionary lending practices termed redlining. Redlining was a specific strategy designed to limit and/or deny access to capital (Squires 1994; Meyer 2000), resulting in higher lending costs for minority households.

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Banks implemented redlining and exclusionary lending practices to prevent minorities from moving into Euro-American neighborhoods and from having equal access to capital (Meyer 2000). This practice continued into the 1970s, during which time the entire industry was strongly criticized by civil rights leaders and federal agencies responsible for regulating the banking industry (Doob 1999). This practice resulted in a massive transfer of capital into the secondary banking sector, limited opportunity to transition from renter to home owner status, substantially reduced capability to reinvest in housing, and the decline of these residential areas. Redlining operated in tandem with racist practices in the real estate industry, which purposely opposed home sales to minorities (Massey and Denton 1993). Both industries actively participated in lending and land sales practices that resulted in ethnically isolated residential enclaves through the 1970s and into the early 1980s. Redlining is directly responsible for the historic pattern of significantly higher percentages of renters versus home owners in Chicana/o neighborhoods. This systematic barrier to obtaining loans at market rates structurally harmed the ability of lower income minority workers to purchase a home and/or borrow to improve the structural condition of their property over time. Thus a key status symbol of U.S. society—home ownership—was difficult to attain due to this systemic denial of access to capital. The reason behind the euphemistic labeling of suburbs as “lily white” was interwoven with the practice of redlining. Chicanas/os who did qualify for loans in relation to savings, work history, and credit were arbitrarily denied during the application process (Squires 1994, 46). Both real estate agents and the banking industry conspired to prevent applicants from obtaining home loans in newly developed communities. The ethnic and class distribution in cities through most of the past century is a result of redlining in conjunction with racism in the real estate industry. Within the arena of private market housing policy was an insidious, institutionalized racism of directed disinvestment that compounded deterioration in housing conditions in barrios. A rationale for federal urban programs developed in response to private sector discrimination that negatively targeted Chicanas/os and other minorities and forced these social sectors to pay increased costs for capital and/or prevented them from making home purchases. The practice of redlining instituted by the banking industry targeted specific ethnic groups and neighborhoods that were automatically denied market rate loans. The banks, in viewing regional markets, utilized the color red to indicate areas that would not be serviced with market rate home loans by their institutions, hence the term redlining. This did not imply that these banks would not accept lucrative savings accounts or offer basic banking services to these areas, both of which were important profit generators. Banking practice reinforced racist stereotypes that characterized minorities as untrustworthy and unable to maintain stable employment status. It also reinforced the belief that property values in minority residential areas stagnated or declined. Loan applications of prospective minority borrowers were not reviewed in relation to conventional lending criteria. The industry placed unfair and inordinate burdens on this class of applicants. Thus, qualified minority applicants with an extensive work history, adequate savings, good credit, and references from employers were arbitrarily rejected. Applicants were never informed that the rejection was due to the policy of redlining; instead, they were given generic and flimsy reasons that implied negative analysis of their

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application. This racist practice dissuaded minorities from applying to major banks for home loans. This systematic rejection of qualified potential borrowers was a hidden component of the industry. When civil rights activists initially accused the entire industry of discriminatory redlining, banking officials denied that the practice existed. The industry considered redlining as normative policy. Minority communities were high-risk constituencies that should be avoided in relation to loan portfolios. Racism within the institution of banking (in which a minuscule number of minorities held professional positions) was also an important factor during this era (Orlans 1992b). Minorities in banking were relegated to entry-level positions from which advancement into managerial positions was virtually impossible. This racial barrier characterized employment patterns into the 1980s (Orlans 1992b). Loan activity in Chicana/o neighborhoods was forced into the secondary home financing market. This sector is oriented toward prospective borrowers who have been rejected by major banking institutions. A key strategy is to focus on applicants who meet conventional lending thresholds. However, obtaining a loan on the secondary market also mandated a regressive change in the structure of home loan underwriting criteria (Squires 1994, 71–4). For instance, borrowers were confronted with higher origination fees and interest rates, and other demands that only applied to minority borrowers. This resulted in higher direct costs for prospective home owners, forcing them into excessive long-term debt and eroding their savings. This type of “loan gouging” was endemic in the secondary market. Unfortunately, minority borrowers had no choice because they were excluded from the conventional banking sector. For over fifty years, systemic racism in banking translated into a massive transfer of wealth from lower-income communities directly into the mortgage banking industry (Squires 1994). Redlining resulted in uneven development within barrios, the impact of which continues into the current era. The characterization of declining residential neighborhoods and substandard housing conditions are correlated to racist banking industry practices. In conjunction with the directed mismanagement of the War on Poverty, redlining proved fatal to the economies of barrios. Lower-income household budgets were stretched to the limit to meet the excessive burdens of obtaining capital from the secondary market. This hindered the ability to restore personal savings, reinvest in homes, and establish college funds for children, and it eroded consumer purchasing power. The history of structurally uneven development is centered on the practice of redlining and the transfer of capital—capital which should have been available to maintain and restore property value over time in colonias. The regressive impacts of redlining were denial of housing opportunities to qualified Chicanas/os and/or inordinately higher costs of home ownership. The banking industry’s directed attack against minority borrowers is a fundamental characteristic of land tenure and household income patterns during the twentieth century (Massey and Denton 1993). Due to redlining, numerous Chicanas/os were forced into a permanent renter class, many members of which, in spite of a strong work ethic, could not meet the capital demands of the secondary home mortgage market. Those households that did qualify in the secondary market were forced to buy lower-priced homes mainly because these households were subjected to higher fees and interest rates than were found in the regional average. This translated into a permanent financial burden and a reduction in expendable income. This

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unfair, racist-oriented debt burden also created a major barrier to reinvesting in home renovations necessary to maintain quality conditions and limited capability to expand homes in relation to family size. As a result of the limitations placed upon the capacity of minority home owners to remodel their property, gradual decline and deterioration further complicated the demand for neighborhood revitalization in the 1970s and 1980s. The cost of borrowing money had a residual influence on the long-term economic vitality of redlined neighborhoods (Squires 1994). Another factor was that a high number of renters resulted in accelerated deterioration of speculative housing, which co-existed with single-family home ownership in barrios. Thus, families that incurred further demands on the household budget for home improvements did not benefit from the anticipated appreciation in property value that was characteristic of the national housing market during the postWorld War II suburban expansion. Redlining, acting in conjunction with racist mortgage covenants embedded in federal legislation and the real estate industry, reinforced a system of racial apartheid in residential communities throughout the Southwest. The establishment of Chicano barrios was the result of an ethnic enclave consciousness and racist market forces (Acuna 1972; Romo 1983; Camarillo 1993). In the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s, these market forces dictated the locational patterns of both urban and rural barrios in the United States. In this instance, the structural relationship between the banking and real estate industries directed a strategy of ethnically-based exclusionary practices against Chicana/os. The denial of market rate capital for home purchase also forced hundreds of thousands of hard working, credit-worthy Chicanas/os into a permanent renter class. The struggle for civil rights that exploded in the 1950s and 1960s would also challenge this legacy of bitter economic discrimination. The issues confronting American society, led in part by a radicalized Chicana/o youth fighting against racist and reactionary private and public sector interests, prompted a call for an attempt for political peace based on structural urban policy reforms. This movement eventually incorporated strident economic demands to end discriminatory redlining and banking industry practices in the post-Civil Rights era (Meyerson 1986).

The War on Poverty and the Illusion of Reinvestment after 1970 The raging societal conflict on racism and discrimination reflected political and economic demands by minorities who were no longer willing to tolerate discrimination. There existed a decidedly urban context to both inner-city insurrections and economic demands. Political frustration among minorities was related to the insensitive implementation of urban renewal programs in the 1950s and 1960s (Hartman 1974; Sugrue 1996), through which entire neighborhoods were overtly targeted for destruction. Pasadena, California, and Tucson are examples of cities in which urban barrios were emasculated during this period. Massive dislocation was compounded by two factors: a lack of affordable replacement housing and scant job and business creation opportunities for members of displaced communities. Mounting social tension and frequent urban eruptions fractured U.S. society, partially as a consequence of racist urban policy.

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The political arena, totally inept in developing solutions to social crises in the 1960s, was paralyzed. Numerous local governments refused to acknowledge the economic and political ravages of historic racism on Latina/o and African-American communities, and a states’ rights logic precluded meaningful change at the state and regional level (Morris 1984; Branch 1988). In fact, a vast majority of Euro-American political leaders could not comprehend the depth of dissatisfaction on the part of minority communities with the status quo power relations. Many expressed indignance with the “aggressiveness” of minority activists no longer willing to acknowledge racism as the guiding principal in public policy and the political economy (Kushnick 1996). Localized cartels of power, a triad of economic, political, and police elites, united in opposition to civil rights reforms (Sugrue 1996). Change was not gradual—it was nonexistent throughout the Southwest. The crises over civil rights mandated a national solution in terms of political access and economic opportunity. Congress, with a strong Southern delegation composed of virulent segregationists, constituted an ironclad voting bloc that vetoed meaningful change (Morris 1984; Branch 1988). In conjunction with the student free speech movement (which was rapidly followed by the anti-Vietnam War mobilization), the lack of legislative remedies rendered a cohesive domestic policy rudderless (Gitlin 1987). A dual divide, ethnic and generational, splintered the fabric of civic society (Gitlin 1987). Mounting violence, often police and/or vigilante initiated, increased the pressure on Congress to respond with structural reforms addressing racism and discrimination. Following President Kennedy’s assassination was the unanticipated ascendancy of Lyndon Johnson, a Southerner, to the presidency. President Johnson’s persona and presidency would prove pivotal in forcing Congress to adopt civil rights legislation. His persuasive capabilities and pre-eminent personal political prestige were determining factors in efforts to lobby Southern members of Congress to support an historic mid-1960s era of political and economic legislation (Dallek 1998). This legislation would eventually transform civic society, ethnic relations, and urban policy on a national scale. However, in regard to barrios and other minority communities, the promise of change that occurred at the local level was distinctly different from the federal government’s vision of reform. After Congress passed the historic Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, President Johnson was committed to pursuing the grandiose domestic reform agenda originally conceived by his predecessor (Dallek 1998). He realized that reforms solely based on political rights and changes in civic society were an inadequate response to the bitter and tragic legacy of American racism. Economic empowerment, urban crises, and economic opportunity were fundamental components fueling urban unrest and opposition (Morris 1984; Branch 1988). Changing the context of racism in America and transforming ethnic relations also demanded structural economic reforms in the form of federal intervention to regain control over domestic conflicts spiraling beyond the control of the political system. In the president’s dramatic May 1964 address to the nation, he labeled America “the Great Society.” During the speech he expressed a sense of personal shame that severe poverty was a serious crisis and challenged the world’s leading economic power to provide assistance to all citizens. The president clearly stated that it was an embarrassment that hunger, lack of education, poor health care, malnutrition, and inadequate housing plagued the nation. He presented a comprehensive domestic strategy

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to dramatically change the federal government’s role in urban policy, declaring that his administration would lead “the War on Poverty” with an unprecedented level of federal programs and funding to support a broad range of economic demands from minority communities throughout the nation (Dallek 1998; Kaplan et al. 1970). The War on Poverty signaled a kind of second New Deal in terms of the federal largess that was dedicated to fighting urban problems (Piven and Cloward 1997). The federal government assumed the mantle of an all-purpose urban development banker, offering a host of loans, grants, programs, and technical support to cities. The strategy eventually resulted in the transfer of tens of billions of federal aid directly to cities, establishing a new and unprecedented era of power relations between Washington, D.C. and local government (Hamilton and Hamilton 1986; Rowland 1971). The focal point of the administration’s strategy was the development of HUD and the establishment of a major new programmatic framework, the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) (Wilson 1966). The policy orientation was uneven and unwieldy in relation to both the scope and implementation challenges. In one evening, the nation was told that it would embark on a war that included housing, economic development, citizen empowerment, teen centers, educational programs for preschoolers, and technical assistance funding for cities. The goal was to revitalize deteriorating and declining inner city neighborhoods and commercial districts, mainly in lower-income minority communities. In addition, college opportunities for minorities were to be substantially expanded and Affirmative Action policies were to begin addressing employment discrimination and government contracting barriers against minorities and women. Furthermore, new federal regulations required direct citizen participation by residents in impacted areas. Local governments were encouraged to link redevelopment and revitalization strategies with a host of new federally funded reinvestment activities. Thus a new era of domestic enlightenment was ushered in by a member of the Deep South’s political establishment. Unfortunately, national optimism would rapidly become enmeshed with the raging controversy over the war in Vietnam and hindered by the massive drain on federal tax revenues demanded by the Pentagon. Initially, President Johnson’s urban strategy received praise and an acknowledgment that the federal government was acting responsibly in leading the effort to revitalize declining areas. Previously, local and state governments had complained about the lack of revenue to adequately address urban revitalization and the reality of uneven development in deteriorating communities. The promise of a massive infusion of federal funds was welcomed, if not celebrated, by mayors and civic leaders. The program framework of a block grant implied strong local control over implementation issues and a retention of status quo power relations between Euro-American city councils and marginalized minority constituencies. Thus, the first battle of the war was fought over political control instead of policy implementation. In recognition of a major complaint by civil rights leaders concerning the inherent unfairness in urban redevelopment programs, HUD regulations ceded direct political power to citizen committees in areas targeted for federal support. The prior era of “people removal” was a period in which area residents had no political, administrative, or legal rights to oppose projects approved by the local jurisdiction. Any tangible benefits—such as relocation into quality housing, new jobs, or the ability of minority businesses to return to reconstructed commercial zones—resulting from these new developments were not

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made available to displaced residents. A sense of frustration and opposition evolved out of this harsh treatment of minority residents. To address this conflict, HUD regulations mandated the establishment of citizen advisory committees in targeted neighborhoods and required strong political input by citizens over projects prior to their inclusion in CDBG applications. This reform implied that the community would have direct control over the policy framework and an ability to disagree with local officials. In the last era in which the political arena was domineered by Euro-American males, this regulation created immediate tension. Power relations were dramatically transformed in relation to ethnicity, class, and gender. For the first time, civic elites had to not only listen, but actually negotiate with a marginalized, discriminated underclass to obtain funds from HUD. The shock of this power shift was too radical, cultural and otherwise, for conservative politicians. They could not cope with the idea of granting direct political control to minority communities. A national lobbying effort in which city officials complained bitterly to congress that their legitimate political power was being circumvented by HUD regulations ensued (Piven and Cloward 1971). The main argument was that nonelected minorities were exerting significant political power over federal revitalization programs. The elected local entity, the city council, could not submit an application if minority community leaders did not agree with local officials on benefits of specific projects. Obviously, the federal government had failed to accurately assess the ramifications of racism in a local politics that had historically precluded minorities from positions of electoral power. When Congress decided to revisit this new HUD approach of local political empowerment for minorities, the policy became threatened. In fact, without strong minority representation in Congress, HUD policy “reforms” effectively neutralized citizen committees by reconstituting them as advisory entities. This early reform had a significant negative impact on the implementation of CDBG programs, hindering the ability of Chicanas/os and other minorities to demand affordable housing developments that would produce tangible benefits and proactive redistribution policies to address terminally uneven development. This “first battle” of the war ceded power back to a racist, elitist cartel that typified local power relations in America prior to the modern Civil Rights movement. Local elites now had the best of both worlds: massive infusion of federal funds and a weak system of redress for minority communities. This initial debate over power relations caused permanent damage to the conflictive political terrain of reallocation policy. Chicanas/os and Afro-Americans lost the war to revitalize deteriorating urban conditions almost at the inception of the policy.

Advocacy Planning A concurrent culture clash emerged during the mid- and late 1960s between progressive Euro-Americans who fully endorsed the goals of the Civil Rights movement and their elder peers entrenched in local government. This internecine professional battle was a conflict over information and the transfer of knowledge and was centered within city planning—the profession charged with rationalizing urban systems and developing strategies to address declining zones. A younger generation of planners, educated in the midst of the Civil Rights and student movements, was willing to endorse changes

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oriented toward redressing the ravages of racism on urban society (Needleman and Needleman 1974). An ever contentious issue in the planning profession is the degree to which minorities should be ceded power in the implementation of CDBG programs. At this time, traditional rational-functionalist planners resisted transformation from conventional planning practice (Forester 1982). Younger planners differed, criticizing a profession that resisted transformation through improved relations with minorities. This generational schism remained unresolved for almost twenty years. The fact that some planners advocated the interests of marginalized groups was considered heresy in the senior echelons of planning. The reified, Eurocentric logic that persisted in urban policy was based on a belief that technical knowledge should prevail in the decision making process (Needleman and Needleman 1974; see Faludi 1973). Planners who actively advocated the interests of Chicana/o communities were, in their view, guilty of egregious action, and their stance, existing within an already racially polarized profession, was incendiary. The persistence of advocate planners in their campaign to involve minority communities in the implementation of programs was met with disdain, employment sanctions, and job termination (Needleman and Needleman 1974). The avowed willingness of a faction of Euro-Americans to educate Chicanas/os about complicated, new federal laws and regulations, environmental mandates, citizens’ rights, and the HUD appeals process was perceived as tantamount to ethnic and professional treason. Senior planners simply could not acknowledge the inherently discriminatory practices that were endemic to a profession that often successfully controlled the dissemination of information to and created artificial barriers against minority communities in relation to complex federal programs. Advocate planners devised eclectic strategies to support their vision of a proactive redistribution policy and to demystify bureaucratese for the communities with which they worked. These planners met covertly with minority leaders at night, in locations outside city limits by telephone, or in other discreet venues. For the few minority planners in the profession, entering the profession with advocacy and equity as career goals, racism within planning was a crushing burden (a reality the author encountered in local government). Minority planners were often relegated to powerless positions at the lowest levels of the planning bureaucracy. This was especially problematic in small and midsized cities such as El Paso; Denver; Houston; Tucson; Las Cruces, New Mexico; Laredo, Texas; and Pueblo, Colorado with virulent racist histories. These city governments actively resisted civil rights and regarded minority advocate planners as dangers. This movement eventually forced planning to change its elitist and racist practices. However, this transformation did not occur quickly enough for it to translate into program benefits for barrios and ghettos during the critical period of implementation of the revitalization programs between 1970 and 1985.

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A Critique of Local Government Implementation of the War on Poverty Federal government attention to housing and neighborhood revitalization issues was heralded as essential in addressing terminal blight and deterioration. When the Johnson administration and Congress developed a new policy framework and, more importantly, unprecedented funding for local government, civic leaders felt elated. The elevation of HUD to cabinet status was the result of the cumulation of lobby efforts, initiated shortly after World War II and carried out by mayors (Scott 1969, 611). Prior to the creation of the War on Poverty, the national urban crisis was only tacitly acknowledged, with redevelopment legislation occuring mainly at the local level. But by 1970, the federal government began to recognize the magnitude of urban crises, pledging tens of millions in aid to cities eager for the assistance. At this time, HUD engaged in an intense period of program development that targeted declining inner-city and/or lower-income areas, and it established the CDBG program as the structural avenue through which funding, regulations, and monitoring would be directed. The CDBG is one of the most important domestic programs ever created by the federal government. However, a number of politically driven factors existed at the local level and hindered the implementation of a long-term solution that might substantially increase the supply of low-cost housing in declining neighborhoods. Local elites were often not interested in investing in barrios and colonias, preferring instead to focus their efforts on traditional civic center areas (Harvey 1973; Gottdiener 1985; Tabb 1984). When locating affordable housing units in a city, politicians were unwilling to follow HUD’s decentralization policy. Local Euro-American middle- and upper-class constituencies actively opposed integration of other classes and ethnicities into their neighborhoods (Orfield 1986). This NIMBY logic undermined an important early HUD strategy designed to avoid concentrating lower-cost housing solely in declining areas. HUD’s initial strategy constituted a progressive attempt to integrate society through construction of new affordable housing in middle-class neighborhoods. Unfortunately, HUD administrators had neither the fortitude nor the political support to implement this vision in the 1970s or 1980s. What did occur was a gradual change in the definition of affordability, with funding to subsidize barrio housing eventually being drained by the urban cartel. Local government programs and CDBG applications often failed to address the housing needs in colonias. What resulted was a “lost era” in which tens of thousands of potential affordable housing units in the Southwest were lost. Funding to lowerincome communities was squandered at epic levels, resulting in terminal undersupply of affordable housing opportunities through the end of the century. This overt, directed mismanagement of the CDBG program at the federal and local level is responsible for the current affordability crisis. The constant pursuit by local elites to defend and restore property value in civic centers constituted the main barrier against barrio housing and neighborhood revitalization issues. Whether in major metropolitan areas or mid- to small-size cities, the local power structure was determined to use federal funds for traditional commercial centers owned by older elite families and located in proximity to areas marked for future

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urban development. Rarely did the interests of Chicana/o neighborhoods and political elites coincide during this critical early period. An additional drain on this top-down vision of neighborhood redevelopment was the massive level of infrastructure required to facilitate civic center revitalization. As a result, basic infrastructure demands of barrios were ignored. At the beginning of the War on Poverty, HUD established a strategy to limit the excessive concentration of affordable housing in lower-income neighborhoods (Frieden 1966). The government envisioned a housing policy that addressed discriminatory housing practice and improved long-term stability of neighborhoods. Achieving these dual objectives required a decentralized strategy, and thus HUD required cities to prepare CDBG applications that met these goals as a component to qualify for funding. The federal government’s effort to substantially expand housing opportunities for minorities was opposed by two strong political forces: elected officials and middle-class home owners. Opposition was based on racist stereotypes, a lack of understanding of HUD’s goals, and fears related to integration and land value (Meyer 2000; Denton 1967). Few city planners or local officials had the courage to support a decentralized affordable housing strategy. Middle-class residents could not comprehend the social and economic objectives implicit in the decentralization strategy. Due to the NIMBY factor, legal action was directed against cities that proposed low-cost housing in middle- and upper-income zones. Homeowners vehemently opposed any efforts to decentralize affordable housing opportunities into “lily white” suburban enclaves. This opposition ignored the fact that affordable housing did not necessitate the building of massive structures or a substantial number of units. Early housing proposals were designed to respect the existing character and density of residential areas and to limit the actual number of units to ensure that local market values would not be impacted. But, the political and cultural backlash against decentralized housing opportunities prevented the concept from ever being comprehensively implemented at the regional level. Cities developed a dual strategy of implementing federal housing assistance programs in barrios that were located either within or directly adjacent to civic center redevelopment areas. Essentially, affordable housing demands were forced to compete with the interests of powerful local real estate and development for the benefit of federally financed redistributive policy efforts. Within this political milieu, efforts to construct an adequate supply of affordable housing to meet current and future demand evaporated. Chicanas/os were forced into a reactive policy arena. Local officials placed community issues in a position secondary to the interests of civic centers and zones favored by land speculators. Cities generally complied with federal mandates by developing affordable housing components within their annual CDBG applications. However, they were selective as to the specific housing projects that actually were developed. Numerous cities mismanaged affordable housing funds (Hartman 1986), often budgeting allocations year to year. Up until the 1970s, HUD monitors blithely overlooked this practice, failing to sanction offending cities. Only in those instances when Chicana/o communities actively protested this practice (Diaz 1990) would HUD officials question the lack of progress toward increasing the local supply of affordable housing. However, these minor interventions rarely resulted in major reforms benefiting barrios.

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The Social Forces that Created the Lack of an Adequate Supply of Affordable Housing In the mid-1980s, the problem of homelessness and the lack of affordable housing was “rediscovered.” The problem came to the public forefront at a time when EuroAmericans also found themselves caught in a period of economic restructuring and severe wage decline (Bluestone and Harrison 1982). This tragedy renewed demands for state intervention in the lower echelons of the housing market. Stories of job loss, family dissolution, substance abuse, and hunger embarrassed the nation. What the media and politicians did not want to admit was that the crisis in housing affordability had already been in existence for a long time. That decade’s attention to poverty only served to magnify the depths of a crisis that had forced Chicana/o families into overcrowded, deteriorated homes and apartments for most of the preceding century. What had happened to the optimistic vision of the War on Poverty and the deep resources of the Southwest’s “Golden Age of Taxation” that existed prior to the implementation of Proposition 13? What forces generated the housing crisis that occurred during the suburban boom of the 1950s and 1960s? Why did this crisis appear so dramatic in 1985? Where did the reinvestment funding targeted for barrios in the Southwest eventually go? Racism within the political and economic arenas converged to effectively blunt an unprecedented historic opportunity to resolve this issue. Rather than adhere to the goals of the policy, institutional racism literally stole three decades and tens of thousands of affordable housing units from minority communities. The denial of legislative intent contradicted clearly stated policy designed to address the supply crisis. Elitist implementation strategies magnified the crisis throughout the Southwest and other sectors of the country. Discrimination in the local political arena was rarely challenged by HUD monitors and at times reified by the totally inept federal regulatory enforcement (Piven and Cloward 1997; Frieden and Kaplan 1975). Thus, during this crucial period, the affordability crisis in the Southwest remained constant and problematic. The most regressive influence on the production of affordable housing was the gradual dismantling of the concept of “low income” in relation to housing programs at the local level (Rosen and Dienstfrey 1999). The federal strategy to directly assist poverty-ridden neighborhoods contradicted the urban cartel’s strategic intervention to reallocate resources into favored commercial corridors. Community building constituted a timeconsuming and tedious endeavor (Simon 2001; Stoutland 1999). This was magnified by the fact that over a century of racism enmeshed in the urban crisis had to be fundamentally addressed, both financially and politically. Thus, a vast majority of cities had no intention of directing a significant portion of HUD funding into barrios and colonias during this era. HUD programs considered income criteria for both individual households and entire neighborhoods. The program policy was designed specifically to address areas of highest poverty and the demands of the Civil Rights movement, and thus to mollify urban protests throughout the nation (Weiss 1985; Patterson 2000). Local officials were considered willing functionaries, adhering to HUD mandates to insure that a constant flow of federal aid would not be interrupted. This reliance on local officials was a normative relationship between different levels of governance. What was not anticipated

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was a subtle revolt that occurred at the local level and was directed against the fundamental idea that impoverished communities should be the sole beneficiaries of federal largess. How did local officials erode the War on Poverty’s strategy to increase the supply of affordable housing? They mounted a concerted attack on the concept of income qualification for federal subsidies. For instance, Houston refused to apply for federal funding in the 1960s and 1970s (Thomas and Murray 1991, 325). The fact that a significant proportion of CDBG subsidies needed to be directly allocated to declining communities conflicted with the logic of civic center-oriented trickle-down economic development strategies advocated by many cities during this era (Kleniewski 1984; Gotham 2002). Addressing this dilemma became the second major challenge to how federal programs would be implemented at the local level. Cities began lobbying HUD to expand the level of qualifying household incomes to allow for mixed-income neighborhoods. The idea was that community building should not be focused solely on families in dire poverty. In order to thrive, communities needed a cross section of both middle-class and lower-class families. This would eventually result in higher local consumption patterns, increased home ownership, and the reconstruction of stable neighborhoods. Providing federal assistance to different income groups appeared to be a benign strategy of giving cities a limited level of flexibility to address deteriorating neighborhoods. Unfortunately, the actual impact on barrios and lower-income communities was not the sole rationale for this expansion in the criteria for who could qualify for affordable housing assistance. On the surface, the benefits of mixing income groups to revitalize barrios in the Southwest appeared to be a reasonable policy reform. However, the main reason that cities lobbied HUD to allow flexibility in income criteria was to gain subsidies to facilitate civic center economic development and the construction of professional, managerial-class housing. According to initial HUD regulations, only households at or slightly above the federal poverty level qualified for affordable housing subsidies (Keyes 1969; Rowland 1971; Kaplan et al. 1970). In the early 1970s, cities demanded that HUD change this income formula to allow more working-class families to qualify. Income requirements became less and less restrictive, and, eventually, households whose incomes fell between 80 and 120 percent of the regional median income qualified for subsidies for home purchases. By the end of the 1970s, households 50 percent above the regional median income qualified for affordable housing subsidies. Thus, cities maneuvered the HUD bureaucracy to allow competition for “affordable housing support” between Chicana/o households at or slightly above the regional poverty level and middle-class professionals (often predominantly Euro-American). This gradual shift in household income criteria proved fatal in relation to increasing supply over time. The shift allowing high-salaried professional classes to benefit from affordable housing subsidies was crucial in providing cities with a “valid rationale” for ignoring the tangible housing demands of barrios and colonias in favor of civic center-oriented housing construction. This policy dismantled two fundamental assumptions inherent in the War on Poverty: that blighted, deteriorating minority communities should be the main focus of redistribution policy and that federal subsidies should be directed to the lowest income groups. These two concepts were the reasons why Congress was willing to approve a massive infusion of tax resources into areas of high poverty—mainly

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Chicana/o and Afro-American communities (Weiss 1985). If the policy had been designed to assist middle-class, highly educated professionals, the program simply would not have been approved or, much less, been discussed in the chambers of the national legislature. However, when local governments prevailed upon HUD to allow a flexible interpretation of income level and qualification for affordable housing support, Chicanas/os in the Southwest and other minorities were rapidly shunted aside in the competition for affordable housing support. During the mid-to-late 1970s, the entire logic of affordability became a meaningless term insofar as it was applied to the production of lower-cost housing for working-class constituencies. Without effective political representation, lower-income communities were forced into a reactive position. The physical condition of housing in Southwest barrios continued a decades-long period of decline, and the lack of both infrastructure reinvestment and redistribution translated into a return to the conditions that originally prompted the War on Poverty. The affordable housing crisis, reified in the late 1980s and persisting into the current era, is not a new crisis—it is a dual crisis of long-range regressive governmental policies and private sector practices. The abandonment of the policy designed to construct a significant new supply of affordable housing during the decades from 1965 to 1995 left barrios vulnerable to rampant land speculation and a vicious breed of absentee landlords who were free to charge exorbitant ground rents for increasingly deteriorated housing units.

Chicanas/os and Affordable Housing in the 1990s The affordable housing crisis in barrios throughout the Southwest continued to accelerate in the 1990s. Limited production by both the public and private sectors resulted in low vacancy rates. With few affordable units available (a majority of which were either below standard or poorly maintained), barrios became lucrative investments for land speculators. Low-wage workers had scant choices in relation to price and quality. Los Angeles alone would require the construction of an estimated 298,000 units just to address three decades of failed policy (Housing Crisis Task Force 2000). Renewed attention to homelessness and the lack of affordable housing only served to remind HUD officials that the urban crisis that established the rationale for their societal function had not substantially changed since the early 1960s. Government efforts to readdress the affordability gap in regional housing markets refocused on the nonprofit sector. While it was willing to address the crisis, the nonprofit sector lacked the level of expertise, available financing, and ability to accumulate land needed to meet the demand. In reality, the nonprofit sector has extremely limited production capacity (Simon 2001), especially in relation to regional demands for affordable housing. In addition, financial institutions remain reluctant to approve projects in lower-income barrios. Residential construction activity in barrios is left to small firms willing to accept the challenges inherent in building new units in declining communities. The reward in barrio speculation is a tight housing market that virtually guarantees long-term demand. These

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builders are satisfied with managing one to three construction sites and producing a minimal supply in relation to demand. HUD has not substantially improved enforcement and monitoring of the way cities spend housing funds. The real issue for barrio residents is not corruption, but directed mismanagement of HUD programs. History makes it clear that cities utilize affordable housing subsidies for financially stable professional and managerial households within civic center zones. For instance, HUD has never adopted regulations mandating that cities orient, at minimum, 75 percent of all affordable units to households at or below the Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area (SMSA) median income. Cities are confident that almost any type of “affordable housing project” will be approved even though it may be located miles from barrios, too expensive for barrio residents, and/or function in such a way that the number of lower-income units compared to upper-income units is so low that few Chicana/o families benefit. HUD’s role in the crisis, after over three decades of massive reallocation to cities to address barrio housing demand, is central to this policy failure. Housing accessibility at affordable levels is the most important urban policy issue confronting policy officials in the Southwest. San Antonio, Houston, Albuquerque, Los Angeles, and El Paso are among the major cities with desperate housing situations, in which the demand far outpaces the supply. This particular issue should be considered a terminal crisis in barrios throughout the Southwest. During the 1990s, a major factor in the population dispersion was directly related to an inadequate supply of affordable housing within the historic boundaries of traditional barrios. Poverty is no longer the sole purview of the inner city. Impoverished households have migrated to the totality of suburbia (McConville and Ong 2003). Families scramble for affordable housing in working-class suburbs, other ethnic communities, and in distant, newly emerging suburbs that orient housing prices to lower-wage households (Myers 1999). This factor has only served to generate further sprawl and regional environmental problems. However, this dispersion has not satisfied the demand for affordable shelter nor generated the level of supply necessary for future population growth. When local governments controlled sufficient funding, they had only a minor impact on the supply crisis in barrios. A legacy of the diminishing CDBG allocations is an overt reliance on nonprofit corporations that do not have the capacity for large-scale housing production. This has become a self-serving rationale for local governments to abandon serious attention to the housing issue in barrios. Chicana/o nonprofit groups, historically excluded from urban development programs (social welfare and education have been their main focus), have only gradually entered into the housing construction industry. These communities remain vulnerable to rampant land speculation and spiraling internal competition—all in a tight housing market consisting mainly of substandard units. Local governments have been unwilling to accept blame for their ineptitude in allowing the housing situation to get to this point. First, they claim lack of federal support as the fundamental reason why the supply crisis in barrios could not be structurally addressed. This hypocrisy cannot mask the incompetent policy orientation pursued for three decades: the strategy of civic-centered, “trickle-down economic logic” that failed to benefit barrio residents. In the current period, cities view the nonprofit sector as a “bailout” for generating some level of new production. This method of managing the crisis has become the de

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facto “national solution” to the affordability problem in barrios and colonias. What neither cities nor the nonprofit sector have addressed is the fact that these programs also provide exorbitant tax shelters for their private sector funders (Stark and Turetsky 2001). These lucrative instruments essentially provide a 55 percent annual tax shelter for elite investors—a scheme that can be more lucrative than the actual production of housing. When the cost of the tax shelters is factored into the financing of housing production, the actual social benefit is significantly higher than private sector housing construction for a comparable unit. This is because government has the ability to borrow funds through bonds at lower costs (Stark and Turetsky 2001). Thus, while the nonprofit sector has altruistically entered into the housing industry to address a serious social policy deficiency, it is the sector’s elite investors who actually gain the greatest net benefit from affordable housing construction. The minimal attention paid to barrios is only the veneer for this tax shelter game. Neither Congress nor HUD has revisited the idea of redirecting benefits toward actual lower-income households to curb spending abuse at the local level. For instance, HUD could propose that a minimum of 75 to 80 percent of all affordable units be reserved for families with incomes of no more than 100 percent of the SMSA median household income. HUD could also require cities to insure that a minimum of 50 percent of all affordable housing be constructed for families earning only 80 percent or less of the SMSA median income. Instead, HUD has continued its historic pattern of haphazard enforcement of existing regulations. Cities have made great strides in dealing with the affordibility crisis since it hit its depths in the 1980s (Belsky and Duda 2002). However, the magnitude of the problem has yet to be comprehensively addressed. Lacking federal leadership and monitoring, local governments have continually trumpeted the new nonprofit sector approach, while failing to acknowledge the limitations of this market sector or the past failures to fund construction of an adequate housing supply prior to the 1990s. The only major federal program in effect during the 1990s had a regressive impact on the crisis. HUD developed a new program to renovate and/or destroy and reconstruct deteriorated public housing developments (Williams 2003). The key problem was that this strategy resulted in a reduction in affordable housing units instead of an increase in supply (Williams 2003). HUD encouraged public housing authorities to reduce the total number of housing units within the context of this new program. In essence, as the affordability housing crisis expanded in the mid-1990s, the federal government began a policy to reduce the total supply. The linkage between limited HUD support, the decades of failure at the local level and the shift to the nonprofit sector only magnified the extent of the crisis. The attention to homelessness and the lack of supply that shamed the nation in the late 1980s did not result in an enlightened 1990s strategy of improving housing choice and supply in the Southwest. These communities continued to suffer from overcrowding, a preponderance of substandard units, minimal new private sector construction, and local government indifference. Slum lords and land speculators still retain a decided market advantage in the control of housing type and cost in barrios. In fact, rent gouging has become the most notable legacy of the failure of federal reallocation policy.

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Conclusion This loss of an historic opportunity to effectively redistribute federal funds has translated into fifty years of constant crisis in regional housing markets throughout the Southwest. Chicanas/os, constituting the largest minority group with a (generally) lower socioeconomic status, have been forced to compete for substandard housing within a market that favors land speculators and absentee landlords. In addition, the acute lack of supply predicated the worst types of abuses in the current marketplace: bedrooms rented to an entire family, three and four families living in a single house, and garages turned into illegal units. These are housing situations that cannot accommodate for increases in household size and that exhibit severely substandard conditions. Land speculators were and are the de facto beneficiaries of regressive local government housing strategies and the lack of federal oversight during this era. In addressing the collective responsibility of urban underdevelopment, Beauregard states that “we find ourselves face-to-face with the systemic elements that give structure to society and that create decline for the benefit of specific classes of actors, some of whom are very powerful and central to the dominant ideological framework in which the discourse of urban decline is situated”(1993, 295). When the “new affordability crisis” of the mid-1980s forced the political leadership at all levels to reassess the acute lack of supply and opportunity, the discourse paid little attention to the colossal failure of housing policy during the previous twenty years. In allowing cities to select which social sectors required affordable housing subsidies, working-class needs were sacrificed for civic center amenity units priced for the professional managerial class. Thus, the totality of the crisis continued unabated, despite the expenditure of hundreds of millions of federal, state, and local tax resources. Barrios in the Southwest were the victim of this blatant, structural racism within planning and community development policy. When the media-driven object of consternation became displaced Euro-American workers and their deplorable housing circumstances, the framework of a national housing crisis was reinvented. The same culprits who squandered a king’s ransom in redistributive funding and reduced production in lower income barrios “publicly wondered” how the crisis could have evolved into such a desperate condition. In a convenient strategy to deflect responsibility, local governments and HUD turned to the nonprofit sector for production of truly affordable housing. Conversely, cities maintained production of middle-income affordable housing that fell within their direct political control through local redevelopment agencies. Inherently, this strategy implied two major themes: producing lower-income affordable housing was beyond the capability of local government, and the history of regressive interpretation of HUD income criteria had had a devastating negative impact on the supply crisis in this sector of the regional housing market. The unholy alliance between HUD and cities had failed colossally to produce an adequate supply of affordable housing to the detriment of barrios. Chicanas/os are at the mercy of both the private market and government policy. Barrios were and are projected to remain arenas of rampant land speculation. The tight housing market is devastating for low-wage workers earning slightly above minimum wage, young workers entering the labor force, and working-class families with limited savings. The condition of housing in barrios continues to be characterized by deteriorating structural conditions, severe overcrowding, lack of options other than

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increasingly dense social environments, and substandard code enforcement. Underdevelopment has resulted in a situation in which slum lords can demand exorbitant prices for poor quality housing. The urban cartel remains mesmerized in its quest for civic center economic development that focuses an inordinate level of reallocation resources into narrowly defined geographic zones with no correlation to the housing crisis in barrios. The federal government’s increased reliance on nonprofit corporations and the exorbitant tax shelters embedded in financing this sector produces only a minimal response to the supply crisis. If cities are allowed to remain wedded to a trickle-down civic center strategy, Chicana/o communities in the Southwest will never escape the vicious cycle of overpriced substandard housing, rampant land speculation, and local government disinvestment policies. In the arena of urban policy, the crisis of affordable housing is the site where systemic racism in planning and HUD programs have failed to meet existing demand in barrios. At the end of the century, the conjunction of a projected massive lack of supply and constant population growth translates into a permanent crisis of affordability within Chicana/o working-class communities. Cities and HUD throughout the Southwest appear paralyzed in meeting the challenges of the future.

6 Economic Development in Chicana/o Communities The business character of Chicana/o-owned companies underwent a dramatic shift in the 1990s. That decade ushered in the regionalization of an economic sector that had traditionally experienced limited success in expanding beyond the boundaries of barrios and colonias. A number of structural influences were instrumental in this period of transition. Due to the successes of affirmative action, a significant portion of the new generation of Chicanas/os in the Southwest were educated in the world of business management and found significant opportunites in a range of professions from which they had been historically excluded. The attack on the insidious practice of redlining, which was endemic in the banking industry, gradually increased access to capital for old and emerging businesses in the community. A focus on multiculturalism introduced new opportunities to market Mexican products and an acceptance of Chicana/o-owned businesses. In addition, the national economy acknowledged the significant increase in the Latina/o consumer market and the importance of bilingual advertising strategies. The economic importance of the Southwest has been proven by the substantial increase in attention paid to the Latina/o economy since the mid-1980s (Davila 2001). Changing patterns of business expansion and formation in the 1990s constituted a permanent transformation of an economic sector that relied on an internal ethnic enclave market for most of the twentieth century. Chicana/o businesses were historically located within the heart of el barrio. Early entrepreneurs focused almost solely on Mexicanoriented cultural products and services or conventional retail and service activities that were not provided in barrios by Euro-American businesses. For most of the past century, Chicana/o businesses consisted primarily of small, family-organized ventures with limited market scope (Monroy 1999, 45; Sanchez 1993, 174–5; Acosta and Winegarten 2003). Up until the 1990s, a socially limited consumer universe and structural barriers to capital were responsible for the marginalization of a majority of these businesses. The typical Mexicano tienda was a reflection of the arbitrary constraints forced on this economic sector by repressive banking practices and discrimination in the regional marketplace. Barrio businesses initially centered upon service and retail sectors of the subregional economy. These culturally oriented companies tended to be restaurants, neighborhood markets, or businesses that sold specialty food products (e.g., carnecerias, panderias, and tortillerias). They also included crafts skill-oriented companies such as home construction and repair, tailoring, cabinet and wood crafts, auto repair, and gardening businesses. A number of businesses provided conventional retail products such as furniture, household appliances, beauty products and personal care, clothing, and drugstore products. In the post-World War II era, this business sector gradually expanded into professional service fields such as accounting, travel, insurance, small

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manufacturing, and law. Since 1980, mainstream economic sectors including media, entertainment, medical care, manufacturing, mass merchandising, computer and telecommunications, construction (residential, commercial, and transportation), and corporate franchises have added to the mix. The small barrio business now exists side by side with Chicana/o-owned national franchise properties located in barrios and the larger regional market. Until the 1970s, regional Euro-American commercial districts often actively discriminated against Chicana/o consumers by employing vigilante or state-sanctioned intimidation. Beatings, arrest, and derisive treatment (Acuna 1972) served as a disincentive for minorities attempting to shop outside of barrios. Jim Crow laws and practices, as prevalent in the Southwest as in the South during most of the past century (McWilliams 1948; Barrera 1979), and a lack of bilingual consumer services also served as barriers. One issue hindering the development of business districts in barrios was the small scale of their built environment. A vast majority of these commercial districts were composed of relatively modest one-story buildings. The physical condition of the commercial zones often mirrored the aging and declining state of the broader barrio infrastructure—in dire need of street reconstruction and suffering decades of poorly maintained water systems, alleys, and sidewalks. Only when a commercial district was located on an economically important arterial street did local government pay consistent attention to infrastructure problems. Businesses in barrios have, historically, utilized homes for commercial activities, often conducting retail and service transactions in front rooms. The planning profession has staunchly opposed this nontraditional use of space, yet it remains a staple in barrio business life. In fact, the commerical use of “private” space constitutes a sort of underground economy (prevalent in ethnic enclaves) and has antecedents in an earlier era (Camarillo 1993). This reuse of private space dates back to the early twentieth century, a time when Euro-American property owners refused to rent commercial space to Chicanas/os. When commercial space was available, the cost of rent often proved prohibitive. A business strategy that incorporated the home not only reduced initial costs, but provided the intrinsic advantage of being located in close proximity to area consumers. Numerous retail and crafts small businesses that developed prior to the 1950s began in home-based locations (Camarillo 1993; Monroy 1999). Though prevalent in dense, mainly eastern cities (Jacobs 1961), the mixed use of commerical and residential space differentiated barrios from other communities in the Southwest. As stated earlier, traditional planning ideologies which demand rigid separation between residential and commercial spaces, have long opposed this practice of zoning. But for the barrio business owner it is a locational opportunity—convenient for residents and promoting socialization among different generational levels and genders. This linkage between commercial and residential location also has inherent spatially oriented benefits related to environmentally progressive land use policy (Diaz 1989). Barrio businesses faced competition from Euro-American-owned businesses that had greater access to capital and operated through exclusionary product supply networks and economic sectors. But strong patronage by barrio consumers and a tenacity to survive— factors that were especially important through the first half of the twentieth century— helped early Chicana/o entrepreneurs to survive.

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Civil rights legislation responding to economic issues within these barrio business districts had a direct and essential impact on the expansion of Chicana/o business formation in the Southwest. Three areas of federal legislation are of particular interest: (1) affirmative action in government contracts and procurement (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights 1975), (2) integration of colleges and universities (Skrentny 2003), and (3) antidiscrimination regulations related to the banking industry (Squires 1994; Wainwright 2000). These regulations gave needed attention to the negative impacts that racism bore on economic opportunity and expansion and proved critical in the range of opportunities encountered by minority business developers. The mandate that federal government procurement and contracting procedures contain provisions specifically oriented toward increasing business opportunities for minorities and women was a major structural change within an important sector of the economy (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights 1975). Other levels of government and private sector companies with significant government contracts also had to comply with this federal mandate. This social transformation in government-oriented contracting, which came to fruition in the early and mid-1970s, directly benefited minority- and female-owned businesses, opening a previously closed arena of commercial activity. Prior to the late 1960s, American universities and colleges effectively excluded minorities (Doob 1999; Ogbu 1978). Although a few minorities obtained college degrees, the percentage in relation to the overall number of graduates was minuscule. Equal educational opportunities, mainly in regard to secondary education, were a cornerstone of the Civil Rights movement (Branch 1988). Though civil rights legislation accommodated demands to dramatically increase the number of minority enrollments in universities, racism and economic barriers inhibited many minorities from enrolling in college. As a remedy, federal legislation designated the provision of financial assistance and active recruitment in minority-dominated schools during the late 1960s and 1970s. A subsequent generation of educated Chicana/os ushered in a new era of business creation and development—one that has continued into the current era. Thus, access to college narrowed the competitive advantage of Euro-Americans in a range of business sectors. Reforming the banking industry has proven to be a significantly more difficult endeavor. The banking industry not only redlined barrio residential zones, it also discriminated against Chicana/o businesses in relation to improvements and/or expansion (Wainwright 2000). The denial of conventional business loans was both a disincentive and a financial barrier to innumerable barrio business owners, many of whom qualified for market rate loans and exhibited a considerable history of managing successful small businesses. However, the banking industry dismissed these claims, due mainly to tacit ethnic discrimination. In response, the federal government substantially increased funding for the Small Business Administration (Squires 1994). In addition, the federal government attempted to address these discriminatory lending practices with legislation and lawsuits filed against the industry. This federal strategy, while only marginally successful, has continued through a series of banking reform legislation adopted in the 1990s. This legislation mandates that major banks remain active in minority communities by offering small business loans and designating capital pools for specifically targeted areas that suffered from previous discriminatory practices in the past.

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These reforms ushered in a new era of Chicana/o business activity and formation. The business community experienced an historic shift in the 1980s and 1990s from a barriooriented economy to a regional and, eventually, national marketplace. This transformation has had negative and positive impacts on barrios and newly emerging Chicana/o suburbs. During the late twentieth century, minority entrepreneurs exhibited a new capability for competing in nontraditional market sectors. Civil rights legislation opened avenues of technical knowledge, access to capital, contracting opportunities, and created a new class of Chicana/o ownership and new types of business formations. Four decades later, Chicanas/os continue to benefit from this era, either directly or indirectly, and have become vital actors in the regional economy of the Southwest. Conversely, barrios still exhibit lower property valuations, modest profit margins, and limited opportunities in the regional economy.

Early Period of Small Business Formation From the 1900s to around 1970, the Chicana/o business community, anchored in a barrio enclave economy, consisted of numerous small and mid-sized companies with a limited consumer base. A majority of owners operated on a modest capital base and lacked the financial ability to significantly expand their operation. This early period set a profile for the formation of small businesses in the Southwest that would remain relatively consistent. A significant percentage of owners relied on immediate family members to manage and staff their businesses. Family-oriented businesses developed strong ties with customers. Numerous businesses provided Mexican and Southwestern products and retail items and services that conventional merchants did not. The ethnic enclave in which these businesses thrived emphasized bilingualism and biculturalism, and the small business character of the environment mandated an adherence to a small market strategy reliant on strong local patronage. This occurred in an era when achieving substantially increased sales was considered a feat. Customer service was critically important, given that businesses lacked sales volume sufficient to reduce costs over competitors. Thus, barrio businesses had to absorb a cost disadvantage within the regional market in relation to limited volume purchasing and product pricing. Though many small businesses did fail due to regressive market practices and the tenuous nature of the industry, the barrio business community has remained an important economic influence on Chicana/o urbanism. The small operating capital base and narrowly defined market proved to be major impediments to expansion into the regional market place for Chicana/o-owned businesses prior to the 1970s. Successful expansion required volume purchasing and lower costs— both of which were impossible to do without access to capital. In essence, these business owners reflected the marginalized status of their consumer base. Surviving on small profit margins, numerous businesses operated on a relatively short, two- to four-month financial base. Periodic recessions that reduced demand constantly threated their existence. Bank officials created arbitrary barriers to loans when evaluating the credit worthiness of minorities. Minority owners were required to exhibit higher personal equity or capital reserves than nonminority applicants and were offered shorter loan terms with higher

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interest rates and monthly payments. This discriminatory practice forced most businesses to seek capital through other sources (Bates 1991). They secured funds from family members or accepted difficult loan terms from unscrupulous lenders. These alternatives posed problems that challenged the entire business structure. The crisis in capital was a constant theme inhibiting small businesses from expanding and improving their future prospects. Thus to succeed, the business community was forced to operate on a narrow profit margin and a management system that required daily monitoring of accounts and products. As stated previously, many businesses employed family members for the daily operation of the company (Samora and Lamanna 1967). But some businesses had a small number of non-family, locally based salaried employees. The wage level in the service and retail barrio business sector was low compared to other sectors of the economy. Nonetheless, employment in these businesses provided permanent positions in a nondiscriminatory environment. Long-term employees were treated like extended family members by owners. However, employees were also vulnerable to recessionary periods and generational shifts in ownership. This structure also translated into a limited technical capability to expand operations into the regional economy. Owners had limited time to research other locations, address changing regional consumer preferences, or determine the potential for expansion. They also had a modest level of education. Access to government contracts, which are a traditional avenue for small business expansion, was constricted due to an inability of Chicana/o business owners to actively lobby local government and resistance on the part of Euro-American administrators who controlled these opportunities through the 1960s. All levels of government require that a business be able to offer a significant level of services and retail products when they enter this contracting revenue stream (US Commission on Civil Rights 1975). Affirmative action provisions in civil rights legislation acted to remove some of these barriers. The marginal profit levels of these enterprises precluded funds for advertising. A majority of customers only spoke Spanish, and the limited distribution of Spanish language media was not able to address the broad market (Davila 2001, 60). Without advertising, businesses within barrio economic zones could not promote their pricing and product advantages and so lost consumers to the wider regional market. It was only those consumers willing to explore nontraditional business districts who found the pricing, product, or convenience that existed in barrio commercial districts (in fact this remains a reality in the current era). Products, staff, and image are interlinking factors in maintaining a consistent consumer base. Responding to the demands of their local customers, barrio businesses often offered products and services found in Mexico or other regions of the Southwest (Gonzales 1993; Valle and Torres 2000). They also responded to the limited income levels of their customers by offering extended credit. This economic sector took advantage of its ability to respond to micro market demands in order to remain profitable and to generate loyal, long-term patronage. Owners generally lived and worked in the barrio—a factor that lent itself to a sense of collective identity and helped in maintaining a stable business relationship with the barrio community (Ruiz 1987; Gonzalez 1994; Gamez 2002). In this environment, neighborhood children felt comfortable shopping for their parents, and a level of trust permeated the interaction between owner and consumer, fostering the emergence of an

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underground credit system. Barrio businesses became a focal point of the neighborhood and a locally based economic zone that provided a limited level of employment and community support. Barrio businesses have a long history of providing direct support to political movements. In a number of luchas, these businesses provided food, money and political support to labor movements (Ruiz 1987; Lopez 1970). In the 1930s in the historic East Los Angeles (East L.A.) barrio, the local business community founded one of the first Latina/o civil rights organizations (Ruiz 1987). This tradition of local involvement on the part of business communities fostered levels of ethnic solidarity that have interlinked different sectors of communities in the Southwest since the late 1600s (Hernandez 1983).

Bilingual and Bicultural Services The cornerstone of the barrio business sector is its provision of bilingual and bicultural services for linguistically isolated communities. Although two factors have mitigated this linguistic isolation over the past two decades—the increasing level of bilingualism among second and third generation Chicanas/os and the improvement of bilingual educational programs—culturally-oriented service continues to be important to the vitality of this sector of the market. The inherent cultural affinity that typifies Latina/o businesses translates into a “captured market” in barrios (Menchaca 1995; Bohon 2001). The linguistic dependency of consumers often dictates locational preferences for consumption. This cultural orientation, confronted by intense competition from major corporations, continues to be an important influence on locational patterns and business strategy. Strict enforcement of racial apartheid upon residential housing patterns created “captured markets” for pioneering Chicana/o businesses. The level of linguistic dependency placed upon businesses by the barrio community was substantially higher in the early and middle part of the century and thus established an early market niche. Local consumers were “captured” in the sense that locally owned businesses were user-friendly and maintained a social environment that was a respite from the harshness of racism and retailing practiced by Euro-American businesses. Engaging consumers at their existing socio-economic level, business owners gained a market advantage by addressing the mainstream and culturally oriented consumption demands of their locale. Due to the low-wage structure and workplace stratification that existed during most of the past century (Menchaca 1995; Weber 1994), Chicana/o households experienced varying levels of financial hardships in maintaining large families. When families lacked sufficient funds for food or other products, owners engaged in credit-based relationships with loyal customers—relationships that often extended over decades and generations. This de facto social contract was an implicit acknowledgment that many customers simply did not earn a liveable wage. In the 1970s, Euro-American-owned businesses restrategized their marketing by targeting bilingual and bicultural consumers (Davila 2001). This restructuring was influenced by projections that the next decade would see expansions in population and a significant increase in expendable incomes (Davila 2001).

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As discriminatory-based business practices gradually dismantled, the configuration of the barrio business community also changed. Over the past two decades, these small businesses have met with ever-increasing competition from corporations that have turned their focus upon the untapped barrio market (Davila 2001; Valdes 2000). Corporate America “rediscovered the barrio,” forcing small business owners to shift their market approach and expand into nontraditional Euro-American-dominated commercial districts (Rodriguez 1993; Halter 2000). Since the 1980s, Chicana/o consumers have experienced an unprecedented level of competition for their expendable income. This phenomenon has changed the logic of a narrowly defined barrio business strategy. Some businesses continue to thrive on a conventional “captured market” strategy, but others have either left the barrio for new markets or have striven to encompass a broader concept of the regional marketplace. This is a new environment in which global corporations offer food, clothing, professional services, and other consumer amenities directly to barrio residents, while Chicana/o owners move their businesses into previously uncharted commercial opportunities, which expands their base from the limitations of the barrio economy.

Regressive Banking Practices and Access to Credit Discriminatory practices in the banking industry posed the main structural barrier to business expansion and competition in the regional market (Squires 1994; Meyer 2000). Historically, minority business applicants were denied loans at a higher rate than EuroAmericans, irrespective of business tenure or credit qualification (Squires 1994; Meyer 2000). This history of denial to capital, and thus new market opportunities, contributed to a sense of defeatism among Chicana/o business owners. Without capital and the capability to expand to improve business conditions, small business owners were tethered to high operational costs. This impacted all facets of a business: conditions of buildings, the quality and level of products offered, the number of employees, and advertising. The regressive practices of the banking industry would not be remedied until federal reforms were adopted during the Civil Rights era. Unable to conduct business with major banking institutions, minority business owners were forced into the secondary credit market. The secondary banking industry, while offering capital, charged higher rates of interest, demanded increased personal equity, and mandated higher credit requirements. The demands of the secondary banking industry, along with limited profit margins, substantially reduced the ability of business owners to generate capital for growth. The federal government established the Small Business Administration (SBA) to provide direct assistance to businesses that experienced difficulties in obtaining capital from major banks. But many Chicana/os and other minorities failed to benefit from the activities of this administration. According to Rowland, “…the SBA as late as 1972 showed little evidence of fulfilling this function. In 1969 only one out of seven new loans made or guaranteed by SBA went to minority businesses” (1971, 155). A key issue was the limited percentage of minority business owners in the Southwest. While the program proposed a major financial catalyst to the barrio business community, major banks remained reluctant to lend to Chicanas/os located within the barrio economy.

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This lack of capital negatively impacted relations with vendors and prohibited volume purchasing, forcing owners to sell their products and services at rates higher than their larger competitors. Operating costs were also impacted. Forced into a system of projectby-project expenditures, businesses saw their profitability destroyed.

Local Government Economic Development Policy Chicana/o businesses have historically experienced substantial difficulty in lobbying local government to address economic development issues in barrio commercial zones. Cities instead focused on implementing programs and projects in civic centers and/or historically important commercial zones (Gottdiener 1985; Tabb 1984; Smith 1979). Redevelopment policy in particular has centered on traditional business districts in which few, if any, Chicanas/os are located. The acute lack of attention to the needs of barrio commercial districts during the earlier periods of the 1900s had a direct detrimental impact on the economic capacity of owners to generate activity beyond the ethnic enclave. City governments were disinterested in providing assistance or expending public works funding to improve the condition of these business districts. While all commercial zones suffered during the Depression and World War II (Bauman 1983; Bradbury et al. 1982), mid-1940s civic efforts to improve deteriorating commercial zones did not incorporate the considerations of the barrio business community. Federal and state development programs continued to ignore barrio business districts through the golden age of economic subsidies in the 1960s and 1970s. These marginalized commercial districts struggled to compete with areas that composed the focal point of planning and funding. Chicana/o owners had to address continual decline and deterioration without the benefit of fiscal support from cities. Unable to self-finance street, alley, and facade improvements in the barrio, these businesses failed to benefit from the boom that occurred in the national and regional economy after 1950. When the federal government implemented the War on Poverty, minority business districts in the Southwest should have been major beneficiaries. The continuation of a civic center strategy doomed their economic prospects. Without government support to revitalize declining neighborhoods, these commercial zones confronted ruinous decline during the era of suburban expansion. An important factor related to the underdevelopment of barrio business districts was and is an obsession with civic center-oriented economic development on the part of policy makers and planners (Feagin 1998; Feagin and Parker 1990; Krumholtz and Forester 1990; Frazier et al. 2003; Sugrue 1996). Cities have placed primary emphasis on conventional commercial areas—zones controlled by elite real estate speculators. The logic behind this pattern of federal investment dictated that benefits to minorities would occur as part of a regressive, trickle-down framework in which “subsidized speculation in office and luxury apartment buildings [would lead to] ‘urban renewal’” (Smith 1979, 239–40). This charade only served as a convenient rationale for limiting attention to the structural demands of barrio economic zones. The emphasis on enhancing civic center areas implied that minority business districts are not important in relation to long-range economic development strategy. The exclusion of Chicanas/os from the political institutions that determined the locus of economic policy also contributed to

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underdevelopment (Acuna 1972; Rosales 2000). Without political support, business districts in lower-income areas were unable to reap the benefits envisioned by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. Civic center-oriented strategies placed minority commerical districts in a position of competing not solely against market forces, but also against powerful real estate and corporate developers with a vested interest in civic center economic development. Within the history of urban policy, this strategy has placed Chicanas/os at a distinct political and market disadvantage. Structural underdevelopment has destablized the economic vitality of barrio business communities. Minimal funding to improve infrastructure translated into eroding streets, sidewalks, and alleys, and proved insufficient in halting terminal decline. Expenditure upon public works is an important factor in enhancing consumer perception and capturing preference, and public works budgets are the best indices for determining whether a commercial district is deemed essential or expendable in relation to long-range policy considerations. Barrio infrastructure demands have been, historically, underfunded (Rosales 2000; Ward 1999), and it is this policy of underinvestment that is responsible for a prolonged era of economic decline in barrios throughout the Southwest (Ward 1999; Wilson 1997). Another important consideration in addressing basic urban infrustracure is the comprehensive revitalization of commercial districts. Cities have engaged in broad revitalization strategies to improve both the sense of place and the interrelationship between businesses in targeted zones (Grogan and Proscio 2000). This strategy focuses on provision of street furniture, implementation of facade guidelines, urban design criteria, and funding to encourage businesses to participate in the revitalization of commercial districts (Grogan and Proscio 2000). Generally, barrio commercial districts have not received funding for this type of urban renewal. Cities have tended to limit the scope of support to specific projects or sites rather than develop a long-range vision for barrio revitalization. San Antonio, Pico Rivera, and Denver are examples of the handful of cities in which comprehensive revitalization plans have fundamentally improved Chicana/o-dominated commercial districts. The urban cartel has benefited from barrios while practicing a cynical game of benign neglect. Poverty statistics have been (and continue to be) manipulated to legitimate Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) programs while, simultaneously, minority businesses have been excluded from the benefits of HUD programs (Mollenkopf 1983; Keyes 1969). Whether in terms of infrastructure improvements or urban design projects, these zones have suffered from directed disinvestment from the public sector. The few exceptions in Southwestern cities only serve to reify the ineffectiveness of federal urban policy in structurally transforming economic conditions in barrio commercial zones. Often, the civic revitalization that does occur is merely symbolic (e.g., Mariachi Plaza in East L.A., the Guadalupe Street Corridor in San Antonio, the Mexican American Heritage Cultural Center in San Jose, and Charro Days in Brownsville). These types of projects and/or activities serve as flimsy veils for the structural demands of businesses located directly adjacent to these sites.

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Cities That Succeeded Although redevelopment has generally failed to benefit Chicana/o business districts and revitalize the barrio economy, there are a few success stories. The most notable is San Antonio’s Paseo del Rio, which, under the leadership of Henry Cisneros, became a major national tourist and convention destination. San Antonio supported the West Side barrio business community in its revitalization of the Avenida Guadalupe neighborhood—a major development being Plaza Guadalupe, a site that reflected the vibrant cultural heritage of barrio public spaces (Arreola 2002). Another success occurred in Pico Rivera, a suburban community east of central Los Angeles. This was one of the Southwest’s early Chicana/o working-class suburbs (Valle and Torres 2000). Whittier Boulevard, the major commercial district in East L.A., traverses through this community. For a long time, the portion of the boulevard that ran through Pico Rivera existed as a derelict corridor. But in the late 1980s, the city established a redevelopment district that successfully transformed this commercial zone into a modest, low-scale mall. Frederico Pena led a victorious movement to empower the Chicano/a business leadership of Denver’s Westside barrio to develop a plan and implementation strategy to revitalize the district. After years of neglect on the part of the area’s civic elite, the neighborhood was transformed by its own local business and property owners. Huntington Park, a small city a few miles south of Los Angeles, experienced a significant ethnic transition between the mid-1970s and the mid-1980s. Within a decade, the Chicana/o populace replaced Euro-Americans as the predominant ethnic group. Pacific Boulevard, the main commercial corridor of the city, was one of a number of ignored and deteriorating economic zones that existed throughout Southern California. Latina/o businesses gentrified the district, transforming the character of Pacific Blvd. from a small, traditional district into a vibrant, Chicana/o- and Mexicana/o-oriented commercial zone. Under the proverbial “nose” of Euro-Americans who controlled city government, this district became a highly successful end destination for the burgeoning immigrant community that was transforming the ethnic composition of the surrounding area. In three of these examples, new Chicana/o political leadership was an essential factor for economic revitalization. In particular, Mayors Frederico Pena in Denver and Henry Cisneros in San Antonio effected direct economic benefit for their minority business communities. The irony is that most cities in the Southwest have yet to achieve this level of political influence. This factor is directly related to the failure of redistributive policies throughout the region. The exceptions do, however, provide a profile of how Chicana/o visions of economic stabilization and revitalization have made a difference in a few cities. San Antonio’s civic center experienced the conventional suburban era period of spiraling economic decomposition and decline. The most influential Chicana/o city both politically and culturally during the early 1900s, San Antonio maintained its role as a major economic and locational center for Chicanas/os in the Southwest. It has remained one of the few major cities with a significant minority-majority in the United States. However, middle class flight from the central city devastated the city’s economy. Businesses along the San Antonio River were plagued by pollution, foul smells, trash, and decay. The impact of the middle-class exodus weighed particularly upon the historic

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Tejano business district, the Mexican Marketplace which is in close proximity to the central city. Following his historic election in 1981, Henry Cisneros became determined to address the economic decomposition of central San Antonio (Rosales 2000). He focused his efforts on the declining area adjacent to the river. City officials initiated a revitalization strategy that challenged conventional logic that the river was a waste of time and funding. Cisneros based his urban vision on restoration of the river, economic revitalization, and the expansion of public spaces along this corridor. Paseo del Rio became one of the most successful urban revitalization projects in urban America, with central San Antonio experiencing a period of substantial public and private sector reinvestment. Adjacent commercial districts, particularly the Mexican Marketplace, directly benefited from redevelopment projects associated with Paseo del Rio. Cisneros also attempted to address economic decline in the West Side’s historic Chicana/o commercial corridor of Avenida Guadalupe. The city negotiated directly with existing business community and property owners in the area, a level of inclusionary planning that was alien to the profession during that period. The corridor redesign linked cultural centers and public art with economic development. Plaza Guadalupe is now an explosion of color, form, and cultural identity (Arreola 2002). Whittier Boulevard maintains an influential cultural lineage in the history of the Greater Eastside (Valle and Torres 2000). This important corridor is anchored in the cultural, political, and economic history of the Chicana/o experience in Los Angeles. In fact, it was the main commercial district in the city of Pico Rivera during the 1940s and 1950s. However, with the evolution of malls and other expansive commercial zones in the 1970s and 1980s, the small business character of Whittier Boulevard entered into an extended period of severe decline. In fact, by the late 1960s, it was an embarrassment. Vacant store fronts, marginal business activity, trash, broken windows and doorways, and a rapidly fading facade characterized the entire area. Few, if any, city residents frequented this district. It served as a microcosm for a city that had no vision or solution to economic decline. In the mid-1970s, the city established a Whittier Boulevard redevelopment district. This coincided with the actions of a small group of real estate speculators who were in the midst of significantly increasing the production of new, reasonably priced housing. The commercial zones in the city were small-scale, nondescript pockets generating minimal sales tax revenue to city coffers. The vision for Whittier Boulevard was not significant in terms of its architecture or scale. However, it was significant in the respect that the city proposed to demolish the entire south side for approximately one mile. The district was developed with parking fronting Whittier and a low-scale suburban commercial district set back approximately 200 feet from the street. Despite being an aesthetic challenge, the project was phenomenally successful. The entire corridor, including the opposite side of Whittier, experienced a significant increase in consumer activity. Whittier Boulevard became a prime destination for consumers—from the immediate area as well as from surrounding cities—and its success led to increased economic reinvestment in other sections of the city. Denver’s Westside reflected a similar set of economic conditions and history of marginal barrio business activity. In the 1970s, Mayor Bill McNichols endorsed barriocentered economic policy development. Frederico Pena, elected as Mayor in 1983,

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continued policies and planning practice that assisted minority businesses and economic development corporations in revitalizing barrio commercial districts (Clarke and Saiz 2003), in particular Santa Fe Street in the Westside and, to a limited extent, 38th Street on the Northside. The commercial corridor along Sante Fe Drive entered into a period of serious decline in the 1960s. Commercial buildings were left derelict, there was limited small business activity, and private investment was almost nil. The commercial corridor along Santa Fe Drive, characterized by struggling businesses, was solely dependent on barrio consumers (the only stabilizing factor in the district during this period). The construction of a college campus negatively impacted business activity. Barrio business interests demanded that the city’s redevelopment strategy allocate funds for commercial revitalization. Informal business organizing was the catalyst for the formation of a community development corporation—the Newsed Development Corporation (NDC)—in the early 1970s. The business community had to address three issues: a recalcitrant city government, limited resources for a declining minority business zone, and the need to develop credibility with the public and private sector in order to ensure a barrio-based revitalization strategy. NDC initiated two activities: establishment of a Chicana/o business organization and development of a strong consensus on future planning goals and objectives. The implementation of these activities was deemed essential for lobbying for CDBG funds. NDC generated strong local support for the first economic revitalization plan for Santa Fe Drive. In the mid-1970s, the city financed a facade enhancement project. Subsequently, the city supported subsidies for existing or relocated businesses in this zone. In addition, a housing rehabilitation program, community beautification effort, and a low-interest loan program were implemented. This comprehensive community revitalization strategy linked neighborhood stability, home ownership, economic redevelopment, and infrastructure enhancement to address a range of barrio urban issues. By the early 1980s, the Santa Fe Drive corridor generated more than $100 million in reinvestment projects. Mayor Frederico Pena continued support for locally-oriented redevelopment programs, even though fear of being labeled an ethnic politician caused him to shy away from focusing on barrios (Clarke and Saiz 2003). An important issue was the relationship between local businesses and the NDC. From the NDC’s inception, the two factions developed a consensus and an inclusionary planning process to ensure that local business owners would directly benefit and that Santa Fe Drive would remain the center of economic redevelopment in the Westside. This barrio commercial corridor is among the most successful community-based renewal programs in the Southwest. For most of the past century, Huntington Park was a nondescript, predominately EuroAmerican working-class suburb. The community consisted of modest to lower-priced single family homes with one major commercial corridor called Pacific Boulevard. In the period of suburban expansion, the city experienced an increase in apartment construction and a relatively stable neighborhood-oriented economy. Even though the city is only a few miles south of East L.A., Huntington Park maintained only a small Chicana/o populace through early 1970. Within one decade (from approximately 1975 to 1985), Huntington Park experienced one of the most dramatic ethnic transitions in Southern California. Due to the over-impacted housing situation in East L.A. and the lack of

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affordable housing production in the same region, small, aging communities with lowerpriced housing such as Huntington Park saw a dramatic influx of working-class ethnic residents. Huntington Park’s decade of transition had a significant impact on the area’s business activity, the formation of a new ethnic business community, and a total transformation in local consumer product and service demands. The center of the city’s transition was (and is) Pacific Boulevard. This previously dormant commercial district experienced a fundamental change in business ownership, marketing strategy, target consumer groups, and product types. Pacific Boulevard was reformulated into a bilingual and bicultural economic district, attracting Latina/o consumers from surrounding cities. Since 1990, many of those cities have established redevelopment districts to compete with Pacific Boulevard in an attempt to attract their own residents to patronize local businesses. The success of Chicana/o business formation and focus led the city into a retroactive redevelopment strategy. Huntington Park established a redevelopment district mainly to enhance building facades and specifically to address the congestion issue. The city even built two parking garages to relieve conjestion caused by weekend patronage of this district. The area’s Pacific Boulevard is now considered a Latina/o Main Street by the immigrant community (Garcia 2002). When Mexico’s national soccer team advanced in the Copa Mundial in Korea and Japan in 2002, every victory was vigorously celebrated on the corridor. Pacific Boulevard remains one of the most successful examples of Chicana/o-led commercial gentrification in the entire Southwest.

The Expansion of Chicana/o Business Formation and the Impact on Barrio Commercial Districts The Chicana/o business community entered an evolutionary stage in the mid-1970s, a time when public policy mandates and private sector attention to the “Latina/o market” emerged. During this period, a range of opportunities in the regional marketplace and access to capital created a new period of expansion. The predominant small business model also changed in response to market conditions and a corporate environment that grudgingly began to recruit minority vendors into its supply and production systems. Government contracting was the initial arena of change, with civil rights legislation related to affirmative action establishing new opportunities for women and minority owners. The new wave of minority college graduates entering the job market presented another important stride for the Chicana/o business community. This younger generation—the first to enter and graduate from colleges and universities in historically significant numbers—(Skrentny 2002) developed professional expertise similar to their EuroAmerican peers. These newly minted professionals returned with a new perspective in management, finance, operations, and marketing. This knowledge proved critical in reorganizing business strategies, pursuing new market opportunities, and, occasionally, in making decisions to abandon existing businesses to move into different regions and/or markets. As a corollary to the anticipated explosion in the Latina/o population, the business world projected that the 1980s would see a dramatic increase in the number of consumers

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active in the national economy. Advertising in the 1990s was projected to increase by over 400 percent, with an estimated $1.7 billion in expenditures by 1998 (Davila 2001, 54). Consumer spending power increased twofold between 1983 and 1993, from $103 billion to $223 billion (Davila 2001, 68). These projections induced a corporate sponsored rush into Latina/o markets. It is estimated that, beginning in 1990, Latina/o purchasing power expanded by 65 percent, into a $348 billion consumer marketplace (Torres-Saillant 2002, 447). This level of expendable income influenced the evolution of the Latina/o business community in regional and national markets, while also exposing the limitations of barrio commercial sectors. The clear message to corporate America was that this relatively untapped market demanded a different focus in advertising and product line development. Chicana/o owners with expertise and knowledge of the market began to address changes in the community in relation to retail, service, and professional and culturally specific demands. In addition, astute owners actively negotiated with corporations to increase business opportunities and relations with minority firms. The civic center trickle-down redevelopment strategy produced limited, if any, benefits for barrio commercial districts. In many cases, it actually led to an accelerated decomposition of these districts. The business sector, recognizing the constant structural deterioration of the barrio, took action by relocating operations into nontraditional areas of the regional market. Thus, the new expertise migrated from barrios into suburban or ethnically gentrified zones that promised a substantially improved business climate. Barrio commercial districts that might have benefited from the newly acquired business acumen of this generation of young professionals instead experienced no appreciable change in terms of its market dealings. College educated Latinas/os led a transformative regeneration of economic participation in the Southwest economy. New entrepreneurs entered into a range of professional, retail, and service sectors in which, due to historic practices of discrimination, Chicana/os had not previously been active on a large scale (Davila 2001). This bridging of the professional knowledge gap generated confidence and expertise to enter into new markets and sectors that had no relation to the barrio economy. Viewing the potential of the barrio economy as limited, they focused on corporate contracts and/or the regional market. The advertising community declared the 1980s to be “the decade of the Chicana/o,” perhaps too quickly crowning this community the emerging giant in the Southwest economy (Davila 2001, 50). This symbolic, media-driven mantra did not materialize into the economic success that Madison Avenue gurus projected. Nevertheless, Latina/os were strategically positioned for new opportunities in the corporate universe. The cornerstone of this era of Chicana/o entrepreneurship was the impact of affirmative action. Legislation transformed employment, education, and business relations to include women and minorities. The desegregation of high schools provided an essential and early step in changing the economic contours of racism (Foley 1990; Shockley 1974). It accomplished this by opening opportunities for minorities to enroll in major colleges and universities throughout the country. Prior to the 1960s legislation, the student population of virtually all colleges consisted of Euro-American young adults (Garcia 1997).

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The Educational Opportunity Program (EOP) provided direct grants to working-class families and authorized colleges to open the admissions process for sectors of society that had been historically excluded (Garcia 1997). As a result, institutions of higher learning experienced an unprecedented era of minority enrollment during the late 1960s and early 1970s. The transfer of knowledge, a major objective of the Civil Rights era, had unofficially commenced within this framework of the desegregation of colleges and universities. When this initial group of students obtained diplomas, the business community also benefited. The most immediate impact was an increase in the amount of expendable income within the barrio economy. However, the most significant impact was a substantial increase in technical and professional expertise in business management and development. A new generation entered into a changing economic system—a system that had been forced to address racism and negative stereotypes in the Latina/o market (Davila 2001). This shift in economic relations constituted an historic opportunity for minority businesses in terms of expanding into the regional marketplace and, by extension, nontraditional sectors of the economy. This expertise-driven generation recognized the barriers and limitations of a barrio economy in which there was scant demand for professional services. Barrios continued to suffer from an image of poverty, social dislocation, and limited social and economic opportunity. This new middle class would make its future outside the sphere of the barrio economy, in newly evolving suburbs (Rosales 2000; Martinez 2001). A concerted attack on the racist policies of the banking industry was also critical to the aspirations of this new class. During this era, the banking industry continued to actively discriminate in terms of hiring, retention, and promotion—a practice that was characteristic of the economy as a whole. Ethnic difference was the sole criteria for the denial of credit. Banks failed to develop capital pools capable of satisfying the economic demands of barrios. In the 1970s and early 1980s, civil rights activists lobbied congress and filed court actions to end discriminatory banking practices (Ross and Yinger 2002). The historical reality of discrimination was never a major question—the key issue was how to remedy it. As a result of activists’ efforts, the banking industry was forced to end redlining, generate loan pools to meet the demand of minority communities, and to maintain fairness in the loan application process. Additionally, the composition of the banking workforce started to change, particularly within mid-management positions (senior management conflicts had to wait until the 1990s). The challenge to the banking industry resulted in a gradual, and then an accelerated, increase in access to capital for minority businesses, both new and expanding. However, the established barrio business community still found dealing with the banking industry difficult. The federal government adopted policies and programs to address this crisis in access to capital. The development of the SBA during the Johnson administration constituted a key component of this strategy (Bean 2001). The SBA actively marketed its loan program in minority communities. In order to be considered for an SBA loan, applicants needed to prove that they had been rejected for a conventional loan at least three times by a major banking institution (Bean 2001). However, the SBA program was considered cumbersome and difficult by many small business owners.

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The logic of affirmative action, the most important federal program to promote economic opportunites for minorities, was that the government could strongly influence economic conditions by contracting within its own institutions. The government has long been (and continues to be) a major consumer of goods, services, and professional expertise in the U.S. economy. In the late 1960s, Congress enacted the controversial mandate that all federal programs adopt affirmative action policies to increase contracting opportunities for women and minorities (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights 1975). Thus, state and local governments applying for federal funding were required to adopt minority contracting programs (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights 1975). Though these proactive policies proved to be a significant opportunity for Chicana/o businesses, they failed to achieve their intended aim of parity for government vendors. Significant differentials persisted between minority-and female-owned businesses and Euro-American businesses, and the latter maintained an unfair advantage in terms of the governmental contracting arena (Enchautegui et al. 1996). Thus, federal mandates regarding affirmative action in government contracting had only a gradualist influence on the minority business community. Affirmative action regulations in the 1970s only marginally improved the ability of minority owners to compete regionally. The market expansion of Chicana/o businesses prompted Euro-American businesses, which previously dominated the government and the regional markets, to develop defensive strategies. A popular practice involved the creation of shell companies with minority “owners.” These individuals would be given executive titles, but their financial interest in the company would be far below 50 percent or, as was often the case, nonexistent (Wainwright 2000; Bean 2001). This practice enabled such companies to make use of affirmative action policies to qualify for government contracts while disempowering their minority employees.

The New Entrepreneurial Class In the mid-1970s and early 1980s, women and immigrants made great strides into the new Latino economy. Indeed, the increase in the number of Latina-owned businesses emerged as an influential factor in the new Latino economy (Davila 2001; Wainwright 2000). Women opened service, retail, and public relations businesses in both barrio and regional sectors. The immigrant business community produced changes in the ethnic composition of the regional economy. The following three examples illustrate the demographic changes that occurred in Chicana/o business ownership at this time. Raul Martinez, Restaurant Industry In 1974, Raul Martinez started a food service business in East L.A. Following a long tradition within the barrio, he acted as sole operator of a mobile lunch wagon. During the day, he sold his specialty carne estilo de Mexico at factories, construction sites, and office locations, eventually ending the day at a specific street site in the barrio. His truck generated a base of loyal customers and, six months after opening his lunch wagon, Mr. Martinez opened his first restauraunt, King Taco.

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Mr. Martinez met with great success and, within three years of opening the first King Taco, decided to expand his restaurant into a chain with locations throughout the Eastside of L.A. This sort of rapid expansion often proves risky, but Mr. Martinez was able to adapt his business structure to accommodate the transition by centralizing food preparation, distribution, and the management of the company at an old industrial building in the barrio. By 1995, he had established fourteen King Taco restaurants in the Greater East L.A. area, with sales grossing over $21 million. An important spatial aspect of this business scenario was the adaptive reuse of older, vacant commercial buildings. Many of the sites utilized by Mr. Martinez for his King Taco chain were outmoded fast food stands and gas stations that had fallen into disuse. King Taco played a significant role in local economic revitalization by improving the urban landscape of aging commercial districts. Additionally, King Taco established a distinct product with strong loyalty in a highly competitive industry. This chain exemplifies the way in which access to capital, marketing savvy, adaptive reuse of undervalued commercial property, and a new management structure could converge into a highly successful barrio business. Oralia Michel, Public Relations Oralia Michel, educated in East L.A. and Mexico, typified first generation Chicanas in the post-1960s era. She began college amidst the second wave of minority college enrollments with numerous scholarships and the desire to explore various career options. Within the patriarchal structure of Mexicano society, college education for younger women was viewed as a challenge to the family structure. Fortunately, Ms. Michel’s educational and career aspirations were supported by her family. But, like many Chicanas at the time, she found her college choices limited. Ms. Michel exhibited a strong sense of self motivation and independence during college, a sense of self which would continue into her professional career. Ms. Michel established Oralia Michel Marketing and Public Relations in 1984. This firm was pioneering not only in terms of being one of the first Latina-owned public relations firms in Southern California, but also in terms of offering bilingual and bicultural services. Numerous companies, especially small and mid-sized ones, contracted her for a range of public relations and marketing services, and Ms. Michel eventually expanded her business into both print and television media. Among other important jobs, she was contracted as a lead consultant for Fiesta on Broadway, the largest annual Mexicano music and cultural festival in the United States. In the 1990s, Ms. Michel branched into the sector of environmental and land use public relations. Her client base consists of regionally and nationally based retail, service, entertainment, environment, and consumer marketing companies that have a strong base of Latina/o patrons and that require the services of a firm with a bilingual and bicultural capacity. Ms. Michel’s business serves as an example of the impact of access to higher education and of the opportunities that exist within commerical services that meet the cultural and linguistic needs of the regional market.

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Humberto Lopez, Real Estate and Development Humberto Lopez was also educated in Mexico and the United States. During his early childhood, his family resided in Cuidad Obregon, in Sonora. After his father’s passing, the family relocated to Nogales, Arizona. There he lived a typical working-class lifestyle, taking a number of jobs as a teen to assist in supporting his family and address his personal income requirements. As a teenager, Mr. Lopez realized that a college degree would enable him to move beyond the trappings of middle-class existence. But his high school counselor tried to discourage him from pursuing a college education and to consider taking vocational courses instead (Gonzalez 2002). Such social tracking was (and continues to be) an experience all too depressingly common for young Chicanas/os. Lopez and other peers resisted this advice and enrolled in the local community college. Mr. Lopez subsequently studied accounting at the prestigious University of Arizona State and, after graduation, relocated to California to interview with major Los Angeles firms. As he has stated, “When I graduated from the [university], I didn’t interview in Tucson or Phoenix. I wanted the biggest business with the most exposure. That’s because I wanted to find the business for me” (Gonzalez 2002, 116). It was in Los Angeles that Mr. Lopez decided to pursue a career in real estate. He eventually returned to Tucson, where land values were substantially lower than in Southern California, and became a real estate speculator. He now owns four hotels, manages approximately 2,600 apartment units and is the managing partner of another 1,000 units. He also maintains ownership in subdivision developments in Texas, Arizona, and California (Gonzalez 2002). In similar fashion to the two previous case studies, Mr. Lopez supports a range of community-based civic and nonprofit organizations. His early work ethic, coupled with his drive to move beyond the conservative expectations of his high school mentors, proved pivotal in his later achievements and led Mr. Lopez to become one of the Southwest’s leading Chicano real estate developers. The evolution of Chicana/o businesses as reflected in these brief scenarios from the late 1970s and early 1980s, illustrates the emergence of a different vision of the intersection of barrio commerce and the regional economy. These case studies exemplify the opportunities that emanated from the educational provisions of the post-1960s era. They also demonstrate a few of the range of responses to changes in the national and regional economy that occurred in conjunction with strategically diversified market forces. Nevertheless, the old barrio economy is represented in the attention to bilingual and bicultural services and the decision of many in the new entrepreneurial class to locate their businesses within the geographic confines of barrios. Another stimulant for this economic regeneration has been the establishment of new internal ethnically based chambers of commerce. These associations, of which the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce is the major organization, address a need for regional and local business groups that value Chicana/o business people. Specialized organizations include the Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies, the Hispanic Business 500, and the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers. Each major city has established Latina/o business associations, chambers of commerce, and, increasingly, business groups associated with particular industries. A majority of these organizations were established in the 1970s and early 1980s. They assumed the role of a cloistered club of disenfranchised, marginalized businesses determined to reestablish a sense of collectiveness and to generate new opportunities.

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Initially, these entities had limited resources, few corporate contacts, modest political influence, and a lack of knowledge concerning government programs designed specifically for minority firms. But by the mid-1980s, these organitations addressed virtually all of these deficiencies. Their efforts have been validated with the creation of Hispanic Business, a magazine that focuses on this economic sector. When the “Decade of the Chicana/o” ended in an economic bust, media realized that the advertising community’s earlier projections concerning the Chicana/a consumer market had been way overblown. Still, the Chicana/o business community had experienced a major transformation that would continue to influence the Southwest’s economy into the 1990s. Over the course of this decade, the Chicana/o business community moved far beyond the limitations of the earlier barrio economy, guided by a new generation of educated managers and technicians. The regional marketplace was no longer considered alien territory, and government and corporate contracting opportunities materialized at a level first envisioned in the late 1960s. While this business sector continued to lag behind comparable Euro-American companies, it was apparent that it was quickly narrowing the gap.

The Transformation of the Chicana/o Business Community in the 1990s Chicana/o business development and expansion in the Southwest dramatically increased during the 1990s. The logic of a barrio-based economic system shifted in multiple directions, both internally and externally. Affirmative action mandates continued to link corporations and minority businesses through mutually advantageous contracts. A significant increase in the nation’s Latina/o population, due mainly to Chicana/o and Mexicana/o demographic growth, ushered in an era of new market realities. Similarly, this decade saw the evolution of a significant middle class with substantial expendable income (Valdes 2000; Suro and Singer 2002). Both Chicana/o businesses and mainstream companies refocused their market strategies to capture this significant market sector. In essence, a new period of bilingualism and bicultural marketing emerged during this decade (Davila 2001). A younger generation of entrepreneurs, including a significant number of women, transformed the traditional structure of barrio businesses while maintaining cultural identity. Fostered by membership in business associations, many new Latina/o-owned companies focused on market sectors completely removed from the barrio economy and/or relied on nontraditional markets for a portion of their growth strategy. Change in traditional ownership patterns did not, however, result in the structural revitalization of the barrio. Younger owners and established businesses with new managers left the confines of the barrio for mature and emerging suburban locations. Without the revitalization efforts of a new generation of businesses or sufficient state investment, barrio commercial infrastructure continued to decline. Thus, the economic benefits of affirmative action had a minimal impact on the structural and spatial conditions of barrio commercial zones since, in a real sense, success was a mixed blessing to the larger community since, in conventional fashion, increased educational

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attainment and economy opportunity translated into a desire to move to suburban locations. The barrio economy has remained vibrant despite the structural limitations of the internal enclave economy (Hum 2000). The offering of bilingual and bicultural services have allowed barrio businesses to maintain a loyal consumer base while introducing new products and services to respond to changing demands. The growth of the Chicana/o population ensured the success of this sector. The sense of place and visual imagery in some barrio commercial districts remain unchanged in recent years. These areas have retained a strong pedestrian urban identity. Children, families, and friends intermingle in a culturally centered social environment (Diaz 1993; Gamez 2002; Rojas 1999). This communal and cultural environment provides small businesses with the capability to survive competition from major corporations despite increases in product costs and pricing. However, the barrio economy remains sequestered in a region with a level of expendable household income that is significantly lower than that of the regional economy. Despite this disadvantage, many barrio businesses have decided to remain in their neighborhoods. Chicana/o businesses’ entry into the regional and, in a few instances, the national markets constitutes a permanent transition into the mainstream of the Southwest economy system. Three societal reforms structurally impacted this evolution: (1) an end to discriminatory loan practices, (2) mitigation of ethnic difference, and (3) entrance into major contracting relations with corporations and government. Demographic growth in the Southwest and nationally is the critical factor. Recognition of the importance of the Latina/o economy has led to the commodification of culturally oriented products, is particular food, for Euro-American consumers (Valle and Torres 2000). The corporate advertising of Taco Bell has been adopted by non-Mexican food corporations like the mas famoso McDonald’s, which recently introduced Mexican food at some regional franchises. In a real sense, barrio culture is being remarketed to nontraditional consumers. However, corporate advertising is only an outgrowth of the increasing significance of this business community and its influence on the regional and national economy. The new generation of businesses, in which Latina-owned companies are the fastestgrowing sector, constitutes the second era of affirmative action. Ethnic difference, while remaining a potent force in this society (Mason 1999), has, like gender, ceased to be a regressive barrier to market participation (Davila 1999). The regional market no longer views the introduction of Chicanas/os’ professional services as “pioneering.” Spanish language service delivery and bilingual capabilities remain valuable company assets. The emergence of major corporate attention to the Latina/o consumer market and a coinciding evolutionary relationship with the business community constitutes a new era of integration and acculturation—one that is forcing Euro-American society to accept Latina/o cultural products. The Southern California economy, centered on a substantially expanding Chicano/Mexicano population base is indicative of the future power of this business sector. In fact, the Southwest economy is now being marketed to other sectors of the country. The next century will see an increasingly integrated bilingual market that views the Chicana/o business sector as essential and critical to the economic vitality of not just the Southwest, but the larger national economy.

7 Open Space and Recreation During weekends and warm afternoons, barrios are a social kaleidoscope of minifestivals and celebrations of community. The reality of dense residential environments such as barrios is that their housing options generally fail to meet the demands of large households (Cayo-Sexton 1965; Bean and Tienda 1987). Parks, a central aspect of barrio social life, provide a respite from such crowded conditions and the daily intensity of working-class communities. Leaving home for the expanse of open space, great or small, is a common social activity for the Latina/o community. Here, they engage in unstructured activity, sports, recreation, play, music, and food. This public gathering gives definition to the meaning of “urban.” Open space forms the larger context for the community itself. The barrio has a strong pedestrian ethic, and so streets and front yards form an essential arena of communal discourse and cultural sharing. This social bonding is magnified in parks and recreational areas. They are important focal points for family-oriented celebrations, offering the luxury of openness and a break from the confinement of living arrangements. This timeless resource has always been an intersection of cultural identity and communal family interaction, providing social cohesion for the community. In Chicana/o neighborhoods, cultural fiestas are important social events. En el Diez y Seis de Septembre, Cinco De Mayo, Dia de la Maize y otra dias de celebre toda gente en la comunidad termino. The park is the setting for weekend-long activities involving cultural food, performance, crafts, and art. The social brilliance of cultural performances is reinterpreted between generations and newer waves of immigrants. Parks have not always provided such a welcoming environment for barrio residents. During the tumultuous 1960s, community activists confronted city government over the use of public facilities (Acuna 1996; Garcia 1994), including open space for fiestas and cultural events. Cities resisted approving Chicana/o- and Mexicana/o-oriented events that drew large crowds to public spaces. This implicit social intimidation practiced by city officials functioned to reassert social discipline over minority groups who demanded communal urban space for social and political relations (Feagin 1989). Parks and open spaces were zones of everyday life in which “social tensions” became conflictive in relation to “unwritten codes of social control” (Cranz 1982, 199–201). Chicana/o leaders confronted racism in an era during which even innocent types of issues became polarizing controversies (Garcia 1989, 45). Park access was no different than other social battles conflicting America. In this framework of civic culture, both the importance of open space and the contradiction of public policy collided. According to Henning and Mangun, “less than three percent of public recreation area in the United States lies within forty miles of the center of metropolitan areas containing populations of over 500,000. Inner city areas continue to experience a decline in available open space and parklands” (Henning and Mangun 1989, 258). The crisis in urban recreation in minority communities is, specifically, a history of underfunding that has resulted in significant disparities in the actual level of recreational open space and amenities in lower-income areas (Gold 1973).

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The lack of adequate open space and the inability (in reality the directed mismanagement) of cities to comprehensively address this crisis has, over the duration of the past quarter century, created a dual system of recreational opportunity. The crisis emerged during an era of substantial population increase, especially in the demographic of younger children and teens. Urban barrios teaming with youth were confronted with the state’s failure to provide more than a minimal level of recreational programming. Parents, stressed from low wage injustice, continued to endure deteriorating parks and open space and the nonexistence of recreational programs. In the sense that public infrastructure and equipment are grossly undermaintained and, in numerous instances, scarcely functional, the most basic form of leisure for the working class is a struggle. Fortunately, grass and trees are resilient; otherwise the concept of a park experience might be completely eradicated in barrios. With larger family size, Chicana/o households pose an important and significant demand on urban recreational systems. The fact that these systems have failed to respond in a comprehensive fashion has created new challenges that involve inadequate program delivery and the erosion of recreational opportunities demanded by minority youth (Valle and Torres 2000). In addition, a distinct gender bias in recreational programming compounds the miserable situation related to recreational and sports programs for young Latinas. In order to address the decrepit condition of urban recreational space, cultural workers initiated a new public art movement in the late 1960s (Dunitz 1993; Dunitz and Prigoff 1997; Villa 2000). The movement was led by artists in San Diego, San Francisco, East Los Angeles, Sacramento, San Antonio, and Chicago (Cockcroft et al. 1977). This public art movement incorporated a diverse range of themes spanning Aztec imagery, political protest, community struggles, personal conflict, and popular culture. This barrio art regenerated attention to urban recreation and culture. The Chicana/o Mural movement became an important influence on American art (Cockcroft and Barnet-Sanchez 1990). Public art developed during that period is now celebrated and exhibited throughout the country and in Western Europe. In fact, a major current issue is the restoration and protection of this art movement. Chicana/o artists utilized a common urban resource: empty walls in alleys, commercial buildings, freeways—virtually any “urban resource.” From this movement, other cultural workers were inspired to organize Mexican and Aztec dance groups, literary collectives, art centers, and media groups. Eventually, this movement succeeded in its demands for reform of urban recreational policy by forcing cities to acknowledge the importance of Chicana/o culture. This reform involved the provision of space, funding, and programs oriented to barrios. This led to further demands to improve the quality of existing open space and urban parks. One of the main rationales for the public art movement of the 1960s and 1970s was to improve the visual quality of urban park space. Years of continual neglect resulted in the decomposition of recreational structures in barrios. Buildings were undermaintained, meeting rooms went dormant, and stages and small amphitheaters were abandoned due to severe deterioration. Cultural workers and community members demanded space for youth recreation, art, culture, and sports. However, years of fiscal neglect hindered local government’s ability to respond. During the late 1970s and into the mid-1980s, a period of fiscal austerity (O’Connor 1973; Mermelstein 1975) caused barrio recreational policy to languish. Cities narrowed

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their focus on sports activities to include mostly just young boys. Gender discrimination in recreational programs was the norm when it came to city programs (Domosh and Seager 2001, 118–20). Antipathy toward the arts also characterized urban policy. Chicana/o cultural workers persisted in demands for recognition, funding, space, and autonomy to develop proactive cultural programming. Unfortunately, recreational officials failed to respond. Cities diverted funding for recreational programs and activities to other “essential” government services throughout the 1980s. Decades of neglect in regard to improvements of park facilities had the negative effect of alienating barrio youth. Chicana/o youth, lacking even rudimentary recreational opportunities, understood the symbolism behind a failed park system. Antisocial behavior such as drug use and gang activity—by-products of such neglect—plagued the urban community. Youth internalized the insensitivity of public officials’ devaluation of their neighborhood and reacted accordingly. The fiscal rationale undermining urban recreation in barrios resulted in the cutting of other governmental operations, including judicial, police, prison, and other types of social interventions. Civic leaders failed to comprehend the actual societal cost that resulted from the decomposition of recreational space in barrios. Thus, cost savings related to park systems continued to remain a central component of budget deliberations. These fiscal decisions devalued youth who desperately demanded positive activities to combat the crises of street culture that permeated their communities. Society had failed yet another generation of youth. In the late 1980s, problems related to parks and recreational programming increasingly became the focus of social issues and efforts in the barrio. City officials began to understand the importance of urban open space and recreational opportunity. The decaying of simple park infrastructure such as restrooms, tables, and benches negatively affected the socialization of youth, but such infrastructure was relatively easy to maintain. Along with city restoration of funding to recreational, intervention, and prevention programs came a 1990s decline in violent crime. Providing youth with positive alternatives and focusing attention on their demands creates a social environment in which barrio youth are allowed to engage in fun activities and that serves as an alternative to the gang and drug culture endemic in lower-income neighborhoods. The prevalence of Chicana/o cultural events in parks exemplifies the social significance of open space in barrios and the cultural connections to space. It serves as a respite from severely overcrowded housing conditions. Major events—dance, art, and culturally oriented fiestas—are essential and culturally specific recreational activities that characterize barrios in the Southwest (Gamez 2002; Loukaitou-Sideris 1995). These activities involve the entire family in a broad generational experience that anchors the cultural identity of the barrio. The interaction between cultural workers and community exhibits the power of place and culture in everyday life. For three decades (from 1960 to 1990), local government failed to reinvest in parks and recreational facilities. The public art movement forced cities to revisit urban recreational policy. In spite of the poor state of city recreational facilities previous to the 1990s, barrio residents continued to patronize local and regional parks, support events and fiestas, and to allow their children to work with community artists and dance groups. Overcrowded and under-maintained parks mirrored the state of housing and infrastructure in barrios at the time, and demand for reform of pubic facilities remained a constant

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concern. Finally, in the 1990s, cities began to reinvest in barrio parks and recreational facilities and to financially support a limited level of public art and murals. Additionally, cities have restored and preserved early Chicano murals. However, given the long history of neglect leading up to this period of renewal, it can hardly be expected that a comprehensive list of demands concerning development of new open space and recreational programs could be addressed in the course of one decade. Thus, depite the inroads made into urban recreational policy, many problems persist.

Open Space and Social Meaning in Barrios Barrios are characterized by a lively street culture marked by cultural signifiers. The socio-cultural sharing of space and time—in fleeting moments and in an unstructured environment—is an influential component of barrio culture (Valle and Torres 2000; Arreola 2002; Gamez 2002). The Southwest originally consisted of small, agrarian pueblos. Chicanas/os resided on communal land grants or in isolated areas in which, due in part to climate and geography, local culture was dependent on communally organized social systems (Rosenbaum 1981). This collective approach to social relations fostered a strong sense of cultural solidarity among Chicanas/os—a solidarity that would form the support system for a range of social interactions from political protest to cultural celebrations and mutualista communities. The Mexican-American War and the advent of the age of the railroad fundamentally changed economic and social relations in the Southwest (McWilliams 1948; Monroy 1999). A new political regime, coupled with the transformation in transporation, forced an economic restructuring of this society: from one based on communal ideas to one based on the logic of private property. Resistance to this new, private structure and the forms of racism brought in with the new mobility forged a strong collective identity within Chicana/o culture in the Southwest (Barrera 1979; Montoya 1998). Fiestas and celebrations were important and influential cultural identifiers that generated social cohesion in response to hostile political and social environments in Latino culture (Nash 1989; Bacalski-Martinez 1979). Unique cultural events honoring the dead are a legacy of indigenous cultures of the Americas and serve as a confirmation of shared identity through history. Through events such as the annual Dia de los Muertos, barrio residents affirm the history giving shape to their collective cultural identity. The logic of open space within the framework of barrio culture is counter to that of an atomized, highly individualistic society. Spaces that are more conventionally viewed as private property, such as front yards and porches, are, in their role as social arenas, effectively reinterpreted as communal property (Rojas 1999). These “modes of open space” are a response to the acute lack of state supported parks and open space (Gamez 2002). Barrio traffic tends to be heavily pedestrian in nature, and children use the street as a site for play (the concept of children zones in public areas is a legacy of barrio youth culture). Standing in stark contrast to the car culture associated with modernism and suburbanization, pedestrian-oriented street culture is a major characteristic of barrio life. Due to preference or poverty, walking is a common mode of local travel. In discussing

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the social control exerted by the modern city, Lefebvre states: “Towns (cities) tell us of the almost total decomposition of community, of the atomization of society into ‘private’ individuals as a result of the activities and the way of life of a bourgeoisie which still dares claim that it represents ‘the general interest’” (1991b, 233). Thus, through this modest method of movement, friends and neighbors develop social bonds that are dependent on chance meetings and, in essence, confront the alienation of modernism (or for that matter, convoluted postmodernism). This interpretation of open space intensifies the importance of everyday barrio culture. It is ironic that both new urbanists and “enlightened” planners are attempting to recreate street culture when in fact it already exists, without massive infusions of redevelopment funds, in the barrios of the Southwest. In a pedestrian-oriented society, sidewalks, front yards, and porches are all accessible options for social interaction, but these sites cannot replace traditional state supported open space. In a few cities, civic leaders and the Chicana/o community have collaborated on redesigning spaces to reflect changing usership. One such space is Mariachi plaza in East Los Angeles (East L.A.). For decades, this small urban island had a coffee shop that functioned as a popular gathering point for local musicians. Civic leaders redesigned the space as a plaza for mariachi musicians and hold an annual mariachi festival at the site. Some musicians prefer the old, decrepit coffee shop, but the area still maintains its cultural place as a popular location for musicians. Plazas are central sites of socio-cultural activity in south Texas (or a region that David Arreola [2002] terms “a Tejano cultural province”). Here, public and private spaces merge during fiestas, ferias, tardeadas y otra festivals—events that are, in nature, historic, economic, political, and social. Cultural events often occur over several days, and at multiple locations (Arreola 2002, 184). These community events are among the most important and influential cultural practices in barrios throughout the Southwest. It is through these zones that barrio culture is linked to the center of the city.

The Battle for Open Space and Parks A major issue in barrios is the acute deficit of park space and culturally focused recreational programming. Years of neglect, underfunding, mismanagement, and the failure to address the lack of accessible open space have created a crisis that has no shortterm solution. It is only in the past five years that cities, where the problem is particularly acute, have initiated strategies to address this crisis. However, confronting cities is the inability to obtain sufficient space in dense urban zones. A number of issues, including land costs, political ideas concerning land use, locational decisions, and negative feelings connected to youth have converged to stymie attempts to address the crisis. For example, when the city of Los Angeles attempted to adapt an old bowling alley for a youth recreation facility, area residents objected, worrying that the proposed gym would become a site of gang activity. Due to the negative public reaction, the proposal was deemed regressive public policy and was tabled (Sandra Figueroa interview 1999). The fact that this center is located in the heart of the infamous Rampart Division of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) (the

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smallest in geography, yet the highest in violent crime) was not considered a compelling enough rationale for the building of a youth center. Conventional wisdom in urban recreational policy underwent considerable change over the course of the twentieth century. In the early part of the century, development of parks and open space (owing to ample land resources), was viewed as enlightened capitalism (Buder 1990). The subsequent suburban expansion introduced an even greater opportunity for parkland development. However, amidst the metropolitan sprawl of the 1960s, open space areas became prime targets for reuse. Land that had been marked for future public space (and, in older communities, even some existing parkland) was sacrificed for immediate urban demands such as roads, freeways, and government offices. This drain on open space, considered modest at the time, would haunt recreational planners a generation later. Cities had failed to devise a strategy to replace lost open space or to address the recreational needs of future and expanding generations (Gans 1968; Cranz 1982). In the late 1980s the crisis became unmanageable—a situation that persists today. Over the course of the intervening years, the level of demand for space has increased substantially,while the per capita allotment of park space in urban communities continues to diminish. In Los Angeles, communities with the highest concentrations of Latinas/os exhibit the lowest levels of open space, a problem that appears to be systematic. The Mission districts in San Francisco and Denver are other examples of barrios that suffer from an acute lack of public space. The stark reality is that cities do not have sufficient resources to address the supply question even if land is readily available. In addition, there is no organized movement to address the political issues behind the open space crisis in barrios. Local leaders and politicians compete with middle-class Euro-American areas for scant recreational funding. They have to confront recalcitrant homeowners who view new parks as potential sites of gang activity. This legacy of racism has resulted in a sense of inertia in responding to deterioration and decline in open space. Whatever is being accomplished is piecemeal and involves bitter budgetary battles with surrounding communities that have sufficient open space amenities. Though the average family size among Chicanas/os slightly decreased between 1990 and 2000, the decline is not significant in relation to the percentage of children per household and the need for recreational amenities. The high utilization rates for parks among Chicanas/os is and will continue to be an important policy issue through the next quarter century. Of course, the deficit in parkland affects more than one demographic: recreational policy must also address the increasing needs of senior citizens, especially in terms of programming, activities, food, trips, and social activities. Development of parklands is only part of the crisis. Funding for staff, equipment, and programming is fundamental to the vibrant utilization of recreational space. Cities remain reluctant to allocate sufficient resources to provide comprehensive recreational services in barrios. The battle over adequate funding, while historically problematic, contradicts the growing demand. Cities cannot persist in shunting aside the reality of expanding pressures for bilingual and bicultural staffing and recreational programming. Often, youth rely solely on volunteers and parents to fund folklorico o mariachi groups. While volunteerism is admirable, it is an inadequate “solution” to the deficit in recreational program financial support.

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The most egregious problem has been the inability to link the alienation of youth with the lack of proactive socialization opportunities. Recreational amenities are one of the few arenas of government in which the needs of younger generations factor importantly in relation to policy and funding. Youth intrinsically sense when they are ignored by society. When gyms are closed and/or have overburdened staff, the avenues for positive socialization for young people are dimished. Often their youthful exuberance is channeled into what does exist: violent street culture. Who can blame younger generations who are offered little other than repressive police presence from the logic of governance? While cities are returning to this basic understanding with modestly increasing park budgets, decades of neglect have left barrios with a nebulous future.

Belvedere Park and the Destruction of Open Space in a Barrio The county of East Los Angeles created a major urban park, Soledad Park (Sutkin 2003), in the Maravilla community in 1942. Though the park had few early amenities other than a public pool and play fields, it was, at approximately twenty-two acres, a significant urban resource. In fact, it was the largest park on the Eastside. During the initial years, this park serviced a multi-ethnic Eastern Euro-American and Chicano community, and the open space dominated the surrounding community. The county, however, did not view this space in the traditional context of long-range protection and preservation. A series of gradual physical intrusions would eventually destroy the integrity of the park and substantially diminish the amount of useable open space for the Eastside’s residents. The gradual destruction of this park is prescriptive in relation to the way that ideological hegemony is manipulated to dominate over the major cultural and social constructs of a marginalized community (Gramsci 1971; Darder 1995). Belvedere Park (renamed in 1949) became a target for institutional expansion and an example of social control. The widening of First Street in 1943 was the first state action. Subsequently, First Street Elementary School was built in the middle zone of the park. Between 1953 and 1955, a county court house and the notorious Third Street station of the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department were built in the area (Sutkin 2003). This station, which dominated the southern end of the park, served as an inoculation depot for Chicana/o youth, who (including the author) were historically targeted by the sheriffs. Spending time in this facility was almost a right of passage on the Eastside. However, this was only the beginning of the destruction of the park. In the early 1960s the fourth and fifth freeways dissecting East L.A. were approved by the state. In this era predating environmental protections, minority communities had virtually no avenue of protest to the massive destruction created by freeway construction. The Pomona Freeway (I 60) was designed to travel through the middle of Belvedere Park. This project effectively blunted the significance of this open space to the community. In response, county park officials built a pond in the southern end of the park, an early “mitigation measure,” as an acknowledgment that precious open space had been confiscated. During the late 1960s and 1970s the county continued to build up the southern portion of the park. The building of a county probation office was followed by a major expansion of the Sheriff’s station (for a special enforcement bureau), then by a

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library, and, finally, the southern end of the park was finished off (literally and figuratively) with a community building. In the mid-1980s, the county developed a small picnic area along First Street, adjacent to the school, with some of the ugliest park architecture in the region. They subsequently redesigned the play fields and built a new community building and a major parking lot on the northern border. While these were all improvements to the deteriorating condition of the northern zone, most of these projects further eroded useable open space in the park. Within twenty years, the largest open space on the Eastside had been destroyed. The freeway and institutional buildings, which could have been located in other sites, erased almost 60 percent of the park. At the end of the era of destruction, county park officials constructed a baseball diamond and a picnic area in an effort to recognize that Belvedere was supposed to be a park (and not an office complex). No replacement space was ever developed to address this blatant confiscation of urban recreational space within the Eastside’s barrio. The remaining recreational zone in the northern sector, which was ignored during this period, was revitalized in the 1990s. This revitalization coincided with the historic election of Gloria Molina to the County Board of Supervisors. Supervisor Molina was the first Latina to hold county-level elected office in over one hundred and twenty years. Her leadership led to a series of recreation-oriented facilities and programmatic improvements.

The Influence of Chicana/o Cultural Workers and Programs in the Barrio In the Southwest, cultural workers have a storied tradition in protecting and preserving the arts. The most popular is the corrido, or song writing that captures legends, myths, traditions, life experiences, and the aspirations of Chicano and Mexicano culture of the Southwest and the Sonora region (Real 1977; Tatum 2001). Other forms of culture include ballet folklorico, art, and literature. The bilingual and bicultural legacy is energetically replicated in these forms of cultural production. In virtually every barrio in the Southwest there exists folkloristas, ballet troupes, and artists. Mexican culture first exerted its influence on the urban landscape in the work of the great muralist Diego Rivera. His political murals in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles were controversial, some being eventually destroyed or covered from public view (Hurlburt 1989). The only murals that survived were those commissioned by labor unions. Nevertheless, the legacy of muralists such as Rivera inspired a new era of cultural workers. In fact, one of the first urban land use battles of the 1960s Chicana/o power era would be centered on culture and public art in San Diego’s Logan Heights barrio. Literature from Mexico and South America had a direct influence on Southwestern culture. A Eurocentric vision of culture dominated most the past century (Torres-Saillant 2002). However, a rich Spanish literary tradition that was celebrated in Spanish-speaking societies and Europe influenced Southwest culture during the 1960s and 1970s. The works of these Spanish poets, playwrights, novelists, and political columnists found a new barrio audience, even though this literary tradition was ignored in public schools and English language media.

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The Chicano Muralist movement, born during the turbulent 1960s, utilized “liberated space” to portray Chicana/o and Mexicana/o cultural themes: art that spoke for and to la gente. The artists, mainly locally trained, built on the legacy of the three pillars of Mexican Muralism: Orozco, Rivera, and Siqueros. Their murals depicted populist themes related to racism, repression, and the politics of that era. Aztec and Mayan cultural images were central to the explosion of political consciousness and protest that coincided with the historic Chicano Power movement (Acuna 1996; Dunitz and Prigoff 1997). The avant-garde nature of these pioneering cultural works required approval from property owners (sometimes after the fact) and prompted confrontations with city officials. These officials initially wanted to destroy the murals, fearful of their potential political impact on the younger generation. The mural movement created a highly public role for Chicana/o cultural workers. It eclectically reflected the symbolic social and political struggles of a marginalized community. The movement indicated a new role for public art and an expansion of the concept of culture and space in barrios. The mural movement inspired a new generation of cultural and recreational programs that celebrated the community and reshaped public policy. In the post-1960s period, the distance between Chicana/o culture and recreational policy narrowed. Cities supported culturally oriented arts and crafts, dance groups, music, and literature, and all of these eventually became conventional activities in barrios (Villa 2000; Tatum 2001; Arreola 2002). This constituted a monumental change in the logic of park and recreational policy. The Chicano Mural movement essentially opened the political dialogue of recreational policy and practice in the Southwest. The movement engaged the youth generation, providing creative avenues for young adults interested in expanding the intellectual and cultural identity of Chicanos. Muralists established art centers and collectives, in a mutualista tradition, to provide creative and financial support for youth programs. In East L.A., an entire public housing development, Varrio Nueva Estrada (VNE—officially titled Estrada Courts), was re-created by such murals. Logan Heights in San Diego, San Antonio’s Westside barrio, and the Mission District in San Francisco are all sites of significant public art movements and form the core of the most significant West Coast examples of the power of art and community in barrios throughout the Southwest. Cultural workers established important cultural centers, including Sixteenth Street La Raza Silk Screen Center and the Galleria de la Raza in the Mission District of San Francisco, Su Teatro in Denver, Centro Cultural de la Raza in San Diego, the Guadalupe Center in San Antonio, the Royal Chicano Airforce in Sacramento, and Centro Arte Popular and Self Help Graphics in East L.A. These centers eventually became sites of major galleries, museums, and private collections. Other major art centers that have been established since that era include the Mestizo Art Center and the Mexican Fine Art Center in Chicago, the Mexican American Heritage Museum in San Jose, Mexiarte in Austin, and Chixcanindo in Mesa Arizona. Artists became mentors to a second and now third generation of cultural workers who continue in the grand tradition of Mexican muralists and Latina/o cultural workers. Two other forms of cultural production, dance and regional border music, also became central to recreational programming during the late 1960s and mid-1970s. Ballet folklorico groups have a long tradition of community support in Southwest culture.

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Denied use of public recreational facilities, folklorico groups utilized any space available to practice and perform. Folklorico performances in schools and at civic events were a quaint acknowledgment of Mexicana/o culture in the pre-1960s period. Ballet folklorico is one of the limited avenues for younger Latinas to receive government-sponsored attention. Gender-based discrimination in recreational funding policy negatively impacting Chicana youth continues to be a problem. During the 1970s and 1980s, cities began to fund dance classes and facilities for folklorico groups. While these groups relied mainly on community donations for costumes and equipment, the city provided space at a low cost. Many folklorico groups have been in existence for twenty to thirty years, continually training new generations of enthusiasts for this form of Mexicano culture. It is now common for civic events (philanthropic, political, ceremonial, and social) to include a folklorico performance. Musical expression is also an important cultural product of this era. The traditional musical styles of Mexicano nortenos, corridos, mariachi, ranchera y folklorista are all part of Southwest culture (Limon 1992), having been replicated and reinterpreted since the 1850s. Chicanas/os in the Southwest have created hybrids of some of these styles, especially Tex-Mex music, a vibrant mix of rock and roll and Mexican traditional music. The lyrical transfer of popular culture, history, and society is an essential component of the music. The experiences of immigrants, police repression, economic struggle, personal situations, historical events, political exclusion, protest, and oppositional consciousness are all topics of these songs, and, as such, they foster an important social and political solidarity. A new Chicana/o literature evolved in the early 1980s. In the post-1960s period literary collectives that focused on barrio everyday life and cultural identity were established (Gutierrez and Padilla 1993; Tatum 1982; Hancock 1973). The collectives offered support, sponsored small reading spaces and developed small newsletters and other publications. Self-publishing was the most common avenue of literary expression in this period when the conventional publishing world held a negative and narrow view of Chicana/o cultural and literary validity (Hancock 1973). There were few Chicanas/os who had the support of major publishers during this era. Within the context of a historic cultural renaissance, the Chicana/o literary movement created the momentum for an explosion of new writers in the 1980s (Gutierrez and Padilla 1993). Rudolfo Anaya, Mary Helen Viramontes, Mary Helen Ponce, Marisela Norte, and Luis Rodriguez are among a host of nationally prominent writers who developed their craft during this early period. A recent generation of writers, including Sandra Cisneros, have become major figures in American literature. The Chicana/o literary movement focused on a subject that the conventional publishing world considered unimportant: life in the barrio. Common, everyday activities and practices constituted the center of their work. Madres en la cocina, ninos andar a la escuela y gente en la calle were explored, analyzed, mimicked, and celebrated; and urban strife, gangs, interpersonal conflicts, boys and girls reaching maturity, poverty, racism, and generational schisms were newly interpreted. The reflection of everyday life in the barrio became important, first to the Chicana/o social and political movement, and eventually to mainstream literary venues and publishers. The logic of cultural identity and multiculturalism has its foundational logic in the pioneering works associated with

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this movement. Now, instead of struggling to find an audience and recognition, young Latina and Latino writers are sought after by publishers. Through its social realism, direct challenge to racism in the United States, and celebration of cultural solidarity, art of the Chicano Power era demonstrated how demands for change and social justice could be effectively voiced. By the 1980s and 1990s, this social realism was also being creatively explored in Northern Mexico through banda music. This musical movement was led by Los Tucanes de Tijuana, Los Huricanes y Los Tigres del Norte, who expanded the themes of traditional Mexican popular music by incorporating the immigrant border experience in all of its manifestations (crossing into El Norte, smuggling, low-wage work, discrimination, INS abuse, political repression, and the role of women). Tex-Mex music also utilized themes of social realism and, with the creation of the Tejano Music Festival, significantly influenced popular culture in the Southwest. The emergence of late singer Selena demonstrated the impact of this music far beyond the parameters of the barrio. A controversial new form of artistic street expression inspired by the mural movement is graffiti art. This art form, linked to the youth generation, also encompasses hip hop and rap. Ironically, Chicana/o murals continue to receive public support while graffiti art has been negatively received (Villa 2000). Urban cultural expression, regardless of the form, continues to play a major role in the way that barrio residents experience “open space” and perceive the interrelationship of socio-political symbolism and recreational expression in privately and publicly controlled space.

Barrio Urban Park Policy The fiscal crisis of the state during the 1980s undermined the level of recreational and cultural services in Chicana/o communities. Development of adequate park space, recreational and cultural programming, facility maintenance, design of new programs, and the creation of bicultural recreational policy were all negatively impacted (Press 2002). This retrenchment of recreational activities coincided with an unprecedented level of gang-linked drug activity, along with inter-gang conflicts over control of drug distribution (Vigil 1988). The lack of programs and recreational opportunities emphasized the reality of urban systems that not only ignored youth but in fact created the conditions for increased alienation and social dislocation. The dearth of recreational and cultural programs was not a “new phenomenon” but a continuation of the past quarter century’s historic inattention to the demands of the community (Press 2002). This occurred during a period of increased demands for bilingual services and bicultural activities that reflected the recreational needs of barrio residents. Thus, when local governments began to acknowledge the importance of bicultural programming, they had limited resources to implement new policy reforms. Governments internalize the rote response that “there is never enough funding” for all the services demanded by the public. Constituencies that cannot vote, that is children, are vulnerable during budget deliberations. The lack of funding for parks has been the major rationale for not addressing this crisis of open space in barrios. Officials seem to think that they should placate residents with gradual increases in facility maintenance and programs in lieu of addressing the supply issue. But the issue of open space can no longer

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be ignored, given the substantial population increases and large percentage of youth under eighteen in the Southwest (and other regions with significant Latino populations). The supply crisis will only worsen as demand increases through 2025. California voters, in 2000, passed the first major state park bond initiative in over twenty years: Proposition 12 (Press 2002, 138). This measure, drafted by Chicanas/os in the state legislature, developed criteria mandating that a significant level of funding be targeted on a per capita basis to inner-city areas that exhibit serious erosion of open space. This was the first time that urban parks have been the focal point of a state bond measure addressing open space considerations. Though a long-term funding source needs to be assessed, programs and policies are being developed. This relatively recent change in public policy is not adequate. Two other issues are problematic: (1) the acute lack of bilingual and bicultural staff and (2) weekend activities. Lower-income communities continue to exhibit the highest demand for recreational open space and programs (Press 2002). There is a significant and unmet need for an increase in training of Latinas as coaches and recreational professionals. Only in the past decade, with the explosion of youth soccer, have urban recreation programs started to give attention to young girls and teens. Programs in a few other popular sports, including basketball, softball, and volleyball, have all of benefited from Title IX requirements for equalization of funding for women’s sports at the college level (Skretnky 2002). However, these improvements have not fundamentally improved recreational avenues for young Chicanas residing in urban barrios. Their experience is substantially different from suburban, middle-class Latinas. Cities need to fund recreational and cultural programs that directly addresses the Latina youth experience (Miranda 2003). This is because Latinas suffer a dual negation: they are marginalized by ethnicity and gender. The reality is that Latinas are creative and are engaged in numerous pro-active social and cultural experiences, including dance groups, music, writing, and sports. The problem is that much of this activity is street- and self-driven due to the failure of public policy.

The Social Significance of Cultural Recreation in the Barrios Free space in the city is not technically “free” in terms of tenure and ownership. The freedom is directly related to how everyday users redefine both their social environment and experience space in a culturally defined context (Lefebvre 1991a). Everyday life in el barrio is a social signification that is derived from cultural codes (Gottdiener and Lagopoulos 1986, 12). Adults who actively engage in street culture influence youth’s perceptions of space and social relations. Barrio streets, oriented to youth culture, are a place for children. The concept of play and interactive socialization occurs in the immediate neighborhood, in streets, on sidewalks, yards, and even in city parks. Space for recreation is utilized first and foremost for youth. This street theater is accompanied by music, public art, and/or graffiti (Villa 2000). In other situations, it is condensed, confined, and constricted in crowded apartment complexes. A distinct identity of difference that may be mimicked yet apparently cannot be replicated by civic leaders exists within the context of barrio urbanism. Failed pedestrian experiences have “been surrendered to the techniques of mass marketing and the

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commercial control of mall management” (Gottdiener 1986, 301). Instead of deriving lessons from Chicana/o urbanism, these projects remain insulated from barrio environments. The art of the barrio, utilizing intense cultural and historical themes, provides youth with a positive reenforcement of their identity. It tells a story that the community cares and adults are concerned about the social conditions of youth in an economically stratified society. The question of whether a culturally focused community strategy is effective in addressing the social and economic conditions related to an alienated youth generation remains complicated. Youth demands for recreational and cultural programs and the facilities that meet these demands are a response to the negative influences of the the gang and drug epidemic in U.S. society. Absent an adequate supply of parks and open space as an alternative to gangs and antisocial behavior, youth are vulnerable to negative social forces. Society continues to assume ignorance relating to policy challenges that could reconstruct cities as places where young people are important and the center of urban policy. Unfortunately it endorses decisions that are narrowly based on economic considerations and that endorse a police state logic to control youth alienation.

8 Redevelopment Policy in the Barrio Introduction The historical relationship between redevelopment policy and the urbanization of Chicana/o communities has produced few positive solutions to the reality of constant decline in barrios of the Southwest. In fact, an analysis of the socio-economic conditions and built environment in Southwestern barrios would lead one to question whether any urban development policy has ever attempted to comprehensively address the urban crises within these neighborhoods. The condition of barrios and colonias remains remarkably unchanged since the commencement of the War on Poverty. This statement is not to imply that no public or private reinvestment has occurred, but it must be acknowledged that scant beneficial change—social or economic—has resulted from redevelopment policy enacted since the 1960s. What has evolved is a contentious relationship among civic leaders, planning officials, and the community. Cities have used poverty as an excuse to legitimate the redistribution of funds into civic center development vis-à-viz barrios, and they have abandoned affordable housing strategies addressing demands of working-class communities. Also, cities have mismanaged development policies, thus leading to the deterioration of minority commercial districts. There is a legacy of unevenly directed development funds, and this is a legacy in which disinvestment has remained the most common urban policy response (Harvey 1985; Gottdiener 1985; Smith 1979; Mollenkopf 1983; Friedland 1983). From the post-World War II years through the early 1970s—the most influential period of redevelopment—barrios absorbed the worst abuses associated with urban reconstruction. Numerous communities were destroyed, partially dismantled, and/or excluded entirely from the benefits of redevelopment programs. In fact, one could say that the logic of redevelopment during this era destabilized rather than reinvigorated the economy of the barrio. In terms of transportation policy and route selection processes (and regional economic development strategy in general), barrios were viewed as expendable. This highly regressive orientation toward policy was (and is) related to political repression and exclusion; stark Eurocentrism in the planning profession; and racism in the banking, real estate, and construction industries. The federal monitors failed to ensure equity in the implementation of the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program (Friedland 1983). But over the past thirty years, community leaders have been mounting a “rearguard action” in a weak attempt to rectify the abuses associated with redevelopment. By the 1980s, when Chicanas/os started to enter the political arena at a noticeable level, redevelopment officials grudgingly began to redirect funding into barrio commercial districts and housing production. These officials also involved Latinas/os in policy-oriented committees. But these gains were not achieved without a struggle. Communities in the Southwest had to engage in a range of oppositional movements to

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gain influence with local redevelopment agencies intent on servicing the needs of civic center elites. The environmental justice movement began in the 1960s and 1970s amidst bitter redevelopment conflicts between Chicanas/os and planning officials and economic elites. When this period of conflict subsided, city officials began to direct a minimal amount of planning and development funding toward addressing urban crises throughout the region. Redevelopment has never achieved its legal mandate (Anderson 1964; Wilson 1966; Mollenkopf 1983; Weiss 1985; Gillette 1995; Sugrue 1996). Latina/o communities continue to confront issues pertaining to affordable housing supply, reversal of structural decline of minority business districts, empowerment of communities through direct control on land policy, ending employment discrimination, and increasing employment opportunities. What exists are retroactive attempts at symbolic development projects and programs and—worse—structural failures and/or debt levels that necessitate the dismantling of redevelopment agencies. Though the current period is one of increased political leverage, the redevelopment process is faltering, and policy initiatives that should address decades of state and private sector neglect in relation to the crisis in the built environment in barrios are limited. By the mid-1980s, fiscal retrenchment at both the federal and local levels had severely restricted the ability of development agencies to improve the quality of life in barrios. The era of massive government intervention ended without addressing fundamental concerns of the communities for which the legislation had been designed (Gottdiener 1985; Gottdiener and Pickvance 1976; Gotham 2002; Hartman and Kessler 1978). What remains from this era are isolated projects and minor fiscal/political concessions that are minuscule in relation to the totality of urban demands. Uneven development, the result of decades of abusing process and policy, characterizes this historical relationship. The early history of redevelopment is directly linked to the immigrant experience in the United States. A major issue advocated by the under appreciated Settlement House movement was improvement of tenements. Deplorable living conditions in urban slums compelled this movement to intervene in urban planning issues (Addams 1930; Lubove 1963). Despite their lack of success and eventual expulsion from the early planning profession (mainly due to gender discrimination), the housers persisted in their lobbying efforts at the local, state, and federal levels (Boyer 1983). Catherine Bauer and other advocates for low income housing saw the 1934 National Housing Act, the first national legislation that mentions slums, as a major victory. This act directly addresses public housing (Wright 1981, 220). However, the depression and strictly enforced racist covenants constricted any tangible benefits resulting from this act. Urban America reached the point of economic desperation after World War II. Over two decades of neglect on the part of both state and private sectors translated into dilapidated housing stock, deteriorating commercial and industrial zones, and the initial out-migration of the middle-class to the suburbs. Civic leaders had few policy options for reversing the situation since the tax base was collapsing and local finances were scarcely sufficient to maintain basic services. Cities lobbied for federal intervention and financial assistance for urban revitalization (Joint Economic Committee 1967; Bradbury et al. 1982). In 1947 the government responded with legislation creating the key power for redevelopment and slum clearance: eminent domain. The federal government also

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established a small urban studies bureau, but the bureau had no influence other than performing data analysis. However, this unremarkable early history would evolve into the modern era of redevelopment in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The Civil Rights movement made two significant social demands: political and civil rights and economic empowerment. The latter was predicated on an urban agenda that advocated affordable housing, minority-based economic development, an end to employment discrimination, job opportunities, and community revitalization. Frustrated by the repressive nature of redevelopment, civil rights activists mounted major urban insurrections during the late 1950s and early 1960s. The Johnson administration responded with the creation of the War on Poverty, an unprecedented federal effort to comprehensively address the urban crises. From its inception, the CDBG program incited conflict between urban Chicanas/os and the state over the philosophy and implementation of the program. Three issues remain central to this debate: (1) the expansion of the definition of blight in relation to affordable housing eligibility, (2) the theory of “trickle down economics,” and (3) an incestuous reliance on a civic center economic strategy. The inability of activists and planners to resolve these contradictions led to incessant controversy and oppositional challenges against redevelopment programs throughout the Southwest. Early Chicano-led urban social justice movements were focused on controversies (Diaz 2001; Vigil, 1999) such as the level of tangible empowerment that barrio residents should be given in determining redevelopment policy in their neighborhoods. Legislative policy ceded a significant level of political power to Community Action Committees (CAC). These committees could either support or reject the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) proposals impacting minority neighborhoods. This provision which was oriented toward local empowerment, was one of the first HUD “reforms” of the new HUD policies. However, local elites demanded that Congress limit the influence of minority residents in the decision making process. The legislation was changed to limit CAC’s actions as advisory boards, essentially dismantling their structural power (Moynihan 1972; Mollenkopf 1983). This change substantially diminished the political influence of concerned minority activists and instigated conflict and controversy over the direction of redevelopment policy between barrio activists and city officials in the 1970s and 1980s. Redevelopment policy transitioned into civic center development based on a trickledown logic (Feagin 1998; Fainstein et al. 1983). This philosophy contributed to the historic strategy of redistributing federal funding to benefit the powerful interests of real estate and property owners. Because of massive out-migration to the suburbs (James et al. 1984; Feagin 1984; Squires 1984), virtually all cities began to center their attention on defending land value for the civic center economy. The urban cartel argued that this strategy would ultimately benefit all sectors of the local economy. However, no urban official in the Southwest could realistically locate the actual level of “trickle” that would accrue to Chicanas/os from this policy. Chicana/o business and land owners benefited directly from redevelopment programs in only a few cities. San Antonio (Rosales 2000; Arreola 2002), Denver (Clarke and Saiz 2003), Huntington Park, California (Garcia 2000), and Pico Rivera, California (Valle and Torres 2000, 159, 161) are among the limited examples of cities where redevelopment actually substantially improved the local economy (Chapter 6 presents an analysis of

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these cities). San Antonio utilized redevelopment funds to restructure and transform the central business district, attracting tourism and commercial activity. The city also invested funds in Westside Tejano barrios, revitalizing the economy and making structural improvements in existing housing and building new affordable housing. Between 1950 and 1970 in Pico Rivera (one such barrio located fifteen miles east of L.A.), numerous businesses failed, relocated, or experienced severe decline. Thus the barrio’s major commercial corridor collapsed. The physical condition of the business district could only be characterized as an embarrassing blight, particularly in relation to surrounding cities. The city’s image and treasury spiraled out of control. In the early 1980s an entire section of the boulevard was demolished and replaced with a conventional strip mall. While the architectural design was unexciting, if not unattractive, the response by local consumers was overwhelming. This zone experienced an unprecedented economic recovery that has not since been replicated in any other Southern California city with a predominantly Chicana/o population. What is unique about this instance is that the city’s political leadership consisted primarily of Chicanas/os. In an attempt to address underemployment and job generation, the federal government instituted two programs to encourage businesses to relocate into lower-income minority communities and to target area residents for jobs in the 1980s. The strategy mirrored industrial relocation programs in England that focused on areas of perpetual unemployment. The first program, Enterprise Zones, provided tax incentives, low interest loans on equipment purchases, and social service support to designated neighborhoods (Lemann 1998). The second program, Empowerment Zones (Lemann 1998), was similar, but strived to address inherent problems of the first program. Neither program achieved the level of reinvestment or industrial relocation envisioned by federal or local officials (Squires 1994). The level of tax benefits was minuscule, the cost of relocation was too high in relation to benefits, and local hiring incentives did not justify the investment in recruitment and management costs. A few Chicana/o communities experienced a limited level of reinvestment. However, both programs tended to assist businesses already located in targeted areas, rather than meet the goal of enticing business relocation. Pacoima, (twenty-five miles north of L.A.), a community with high levels of unemployment, was one of the few areas that experienced some success. This zone had two advantages: close proximity to three freeways and cheap available industrial land. In this neighborhood, program investment resulted in a complex of industrial parks and warehouses. Business owners were strategically relocated to benefit both the regional economy and a targeted community. They received tax incentives and, due to a lack of preexisting businesses, competitive advantage. In dense, inner-city areas of East and South Central L.A. (which was beginning to experience a significant immigration of Mexicana/o immigrants), where the zones were initially targeted and promoted, the level of job generation and relocation was insignificant. Another regressive aspect of civic center redevelopment was the manipulation of affordable housing funds. Typified by Los Angeles’ perennial efforts to entice a residential rebirth in its downtown, numerous cities subverted the logic of affordable housing in favor of giving subsidies to middle- and upper-class professionals. Cities began developing high-price condominium towers and apartments in an effort to reverse

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the era of suburbanization and a sense of urban life associated with the sterile, modernist character of cities (Touraine 1995; Jacobs 1961). The objective of this strategy was to place a drain on funding for affordable housing for needy working-class families, most of whom were Latinas/os living in neighborhoods that surrounded civic centers. The cost of constructing “affordable housing” in civic centers was substantially higher than housing production in lower-income neighborhoods (Rosen and Dienstfrey 1999; Hartman 1986; Simon 2001), the main issues being extremely high land costs and the level of amenities demanded by upper-income groups. Thus, cities built fewer units at higher costs, further complicating the affordable housing supply crisis. This strategy is a major cause for the constant state of overcrowding, land speculation, rent gouging, and deteriorating housing conditions in barrios. There are precious few barrios in the Southwest where the urban planning profession can “showcase” a redevelopment “success story.” The community has lost, both in terms of time and resources, hundreds of millions of tax resources in redevelopment expenditures. Where did this money go? Why are barrios still experiencing structural decline? What role did the planning profession play in this charade? Why does trickle-down logic remain the cornerstone of redevelopment philosophy? Ironically, redevelopment agencies that try to placate elites to the exclusion of minorities are currently failing financially. The limited successes that have resulted from civic center-based development have all focused on specific commercial districts and projects. Two examples are San Antonio, under the leadership of Chicano mayor Henry Cisneros and Denver, while under the leadership of Fredrico Pena. At the end of the twentieth century the function (or fiction) of urban redevelopment can only be viewed as extremely regressive, particularly considering the history of constant decline and deterioration that characterizes barrios in the Southwest and other regions in the United States. A critical, ethical problem is the lack of accountability by city officials, politicians, planners, and the real estate industry to lower-income communities. This intellectual amnesia, now entering its sixth decade, may be the real crisis confronting the spatial crises of the barrio within this history of conflict over redevelopment policy.

The Historical Evolution of Government Redevelopment Policy and the Quest to Revitalize Lower-Income Neighborhoods Federal urban policy is directly linked to the initial era of massive immigration into the United States (from 1880 to 1910) that accompanied the country’s demand for low-wage labor and larger national strategy for economic expansion and global competition. Urban housing conditions of immigrant enclaves were deplorable and were decried by many social activists (Addams 1930; Glaab 1963). Overcrowding, substandard (or absent) sewage system connections, dangerous cooking areas, scant open space for children, and extremely poor public services were endemic to tenement districts. But help was on the way, for these urban districts housed the (predominantly European) labor force that supported the industrialization of the national economy.

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Responding to the desperation and destitution of tens of thousands of low-wage, monolingual (non-English speaking) working-class families, a small cadre of mainly middle- and upper-class women initiated the early movement toward social welfare and urban reform. Appalled by the incredibly rancid environmental conditions of the tenements, these advocates mobilized altruistic, yet ultimately failed, social programs to provide moral and psychological support for this population. The Settlement House movement (Addams 1930; Lubove 1963; Bremmer 1960) was a community-based strategy assisting destitute immigrant workers and families. While Hull House in Chicago is the most notable site of the movement, settlement houses were developed in virtually every urban tenement in the nation. The movement was in the vanguard of women-led efforts to address the social welfare of the modern underclass. A major goal of the Settlement House movement was to reform the condition of tenement housing. But these upper-class reformers were totally unprepared for their initial traverse into tenement districts. Slums and rookeries were zones of poorly constructed housing with limited ventilation, one shared water closet per floor, random garbage and sewage service, rampant rodent infestation, and severe overcrowding (Wohl 2002). Those few elites who dared venture into such apartments were transformed by the miserable human condition that they observed in these neighborhoods (Addams 1930; Glaab 1963) and they lobbied for building code reforms (Lubove 1963; Scott 1969). But there were no regulations or agencies in existence to address urban crises. Settlement house activists offered a range of services for tenement residents. They led ESL classes, conducted sewing and cooking seminars, offered cultural programs, provided counseling for isolated monolingual parents, developed public health resources, and conducted reading classes (Addams 1930; Bremmer 1960). This movement also addressed the needs of young children by purchasing lots to provide active play space. In developing playgrounds the movement also pioneered the field of urban recreation (Addams 1910 & 1930; Boyer 1983). Settlement movement workers were the only social service resource for these residents of early tenements. Their efforts, while instructive of the generosity of the human spirit, were inadequate to address the crisis. As we will see, housers faced a staunch adversary in the turn of the century urban cartel. In the early 1900s, the Settlement House movement lobbied state and local government to address the housing crisis. To support their efforts they surveyed tenement districts and residents. However, landlords and authorities often harshly repressed their efforts at gathering data (Addams 1910 & 1930; Bremmer 1960; Boyer 1983). Gradually, these efforts led to the adoption of building codes and architectural regulations designed to improve the structural condition of tenements. The Settlement House movement held a visible position at the first national conference on city planning in 1909 (Scott 1969; Boyer 1983; Davis 1967). While the (male) engineers, architects, and city officials present at the conference were interested in the facade and power of cities, movement reformers called for the profession to focus its attention on the crisis of the tenements. What this demonstrated was a distinct and already present gender divide in public policy (Flexner 1973; Baxter and Lansing 1981): women advocating for the needs of the working poor and males focusing on the economics of real estate development and new construction. Within three years of future conferences, the men managed to jettison the

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settlement house advocates, labeled housers because of their passion for legislative relief for tenement districts, from the city planning dialogue. To dramatize the deterioration of urban housing, settlement leaders developed museum exhibits that depicted tenement conditions with uncanny accuracy (Davis 1967). The broad public reaction to and interest in these exhibits created a backlash among elite museum benefactors (Flexner 1973; Davis 1967). They subsequently threatened to terminate financial support for museums that scheduled exhibits developed by housers, and museum directors cowered to elites and terminated these exhibits. Nevertheless, city officials and politicians were compelled to pass legislation to address the tenement crisis. However, this legislation was largely symbolic, and, outside of the dumbbell design and adoption of formal building codes, these leaders were disinterested in forcing the real estate industry to improve the condition of these decrepit districts. Most local governments actively resisted addressing the demands of housers during this era. The early city planning profession, while expressing sympathy for the issue of poor tenement conditions, was unwilling to actively support the housers in their demand for a government response to the crisis. The emerging profession focused on city building and economic considerations rather than social policy and the underclass. Settlement workers, aligned with the Suffragette movement and the anti-child labor lobby, struggled with scant results. After approximately thirty years, they failed to achieve any significant policy or program that structurally improved urban housing conditions. In fact, planners and elected officials, whose attention was focused on elite and middle-class suburbs and commercial expansion during the 1920s, became even less interested in tenement districts during this period. Government resistance to assuming an active role in tenement housing reform frustrated many housers, some of whom ended their advocacy in despair. The Depression and the election of Franklin Roosevelt to the presidency changed the priorities of the federal government in relation to tenement reforms. However the changes that resulted, while influential to the history of redevelopment, were not significant in relation to concretely addressing the crisis. Led by Edith Elmer Wood, Catherine Bauer and Mary Simkovitch (Mitchell 1985, 191) housers continued to demand sound, adequate housing for working-class families. However, a new and major debate over whether housing should remain in the center of the city or be located in newly developing areas began to influence the movement’s ideas. This debate was effectively moot, since neither the real estate industry nor local government had any interest in addressing housing for the working poor. During the 1920s and 1930s, the situation of tenement districts in the Southwest, whose populations were predominantly Chicana/o, continued to spiral out of control. The Depression and the accompanying collapse of the real estate market compelled the federal government to address the housing crisis. The Roosevelt administration wanted to implement programs that would restore confidence in the banking system and the real estate sector, so his administration supported the passage of legislation that provided for federally backed mortgage loans (and that effectively made the federal government the banker of last resort). With the nation’s economy in shambles and lending in the housing market virtually nonexistent, this New Deal legislation was a great help to the housing development industry. Housers persistently lobbied to ensure that working-class housing considerations were also addressed in the legislation (Davis 1967; Wright 1981). In an effort to placate housers and expand the support base for this radical

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policy shift, the Roosevelt administration agreed to the enactment of legal language related to slum clearance and housing construction for the poor. The historic 1934 National Housing Act was the first federal legislation that included the terms slum clearance and that addressed the need for public housing (Mitchell 1985; O’Connor 1999). Housers had finally achieved their most important goal: national housing legislation related to tenement reform and revitalization. Unfortunately, the federal government had no resources for housing construction and cities were in no position to clear slums in the middle of the Depression. Giving the state an active role in the private market by having it assume service of loans in default was the major objective of the act—not housing for the working class. While this New Deal legislation would significantly influence suburban expansion after World War II, it was, during this period, insufficient to revive the moribund real estate sector or buttress confidence in the banking industry (Weiss 1985; Mitchell 1985; O’Connor 1999). Despite their deteriorating conditions, many tenement units continued to yield profits for land speculators through the 1930s. The public, confronting a crisis in unemployment and severe financial dislocation, was willing to accept low-cost housing in any shape. In the Southwest, these old, deteriorating districts constituted the first urban Chicana/o barrios.

The Initial Era of Redevelopment: 1945 to 1965 The first four decades of the past century yielded no meaningful attention to the crisis of the inner city. Initially, government was reluctant to assume a direct role in the private sector (a barrier encountered by the Settlement House movement), which was narrowly focused on land value and extraction of ground rents. Two World Wars had deflected government attention from urban decline. This situation was further complicated by the Depression, a time when reinvestment or new development was hindered by a lack of confidence in the real estate market. Although the Roosevelt administration sponsored the 1934 housing act, the government did not establish an urban-oriented agency to formally monitor the condition of cities. This role was traditionally deemed a local matter. Crises of the sort that afflicted tenements and demanded reform in the 1880s and 1890s persisted. Still, numerous districts that should have been destroyed at the turn of the century retained economic value. Although city policy mandated them to provide water, sewer hookups, and other modest improvements, most speculators reinvested minimal amounts of money in these districts. It is in these areas that an ethnic transition occurred. These old enement districts formed the residential areas for minorities, with African Americans settling in the North and Midwest, and Chicanas/os in the Southwest. The extremely poor environmental conditions and weak land values of these urban slums thus became socially linked to racial minorities. They had replaced European immigrants as the vulnerable working social class. The industrial zone of Los Angeles, the Westside of San Antonio, and the Mission district in San Francisco (the neighborhood nearest the wharves and factories) were all such tenement districts. Albuquerque’s barrios were located in civic center zones that included industrial areas. Barrio Logan in San Diego was situated adjacent to the boatyards. Tucson’s barrio was located directly in the city’s civic center. Prior to the late 1940s these residential areas were tolerated and

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controlled mainly through police repression and segregated social practices. The barrio housing market was an arena of rampant speculation, with high rents for poor quality housing (Garcia 1978; Achor 1978; Timmons 1990). In the aftermath of World War II, civic leaders and economic elites, especially in major eastern cities, became alarmed at the rapidly deteriorating conditions and the loss of economic value in the inner city (Bauman 1983; Foard and Fefferman 1966). Cities lacked funds to address blight and deterioration, and so the urban cartel was forced to refocus its relationship with the federal government (Wilson 1966; Frieden and Kaplan 1975). Slum clearance was one issue that all levels of government viewed as a proactive strategy in addressing inner city decay. Leaders in Philadelphia, Baltimore, Boston, New York, and Providence invited influential congressmen for briefings on the urban crisis. Civic leaders had conflicting perspectives over the role that the state should take in working with the real estate and development industries (Foard and Fefferman 1966). Initially, civic leaders established elitist-oriented citizen committees to “study the urban crises” and develop recommendations for federal intervention (Foard and Fefferman 1966). They came up with a litany of issues: miserable housing conditions, deteriorating infrastructure, the need for extensive street repairs, mounting social problems, and depressed land values. They gradually convinced the federal government to adopt policies supporting local elites’ interests to tear down tenements and reverse the spiraling decline in inner city land value.

Early Federal Attention to the Urban Crisis During the 1950s local governments increased attention to urban redevelopment and, in particular, to massive slum clearance (Anderson 1964; Weiss 1985; Gans 1968; Wilson 1966). Officials targeted locations within important commercial zones and civic centers. The power of eminent domain ushered in an era of unprecedented state-centered urban destruction that was stridently criticized by both conservatives and liberals (Anderson 1964; Greer 1965; Gans 1968). Cities engaged in the active demolition of older residential neighborhoods with large minority populations, a pattern that would be replicated for the next fifteen years. Two cities, Tucson and Pasadena, CA, demolished historic barrios in which a significant amount of property was owned by Chicana/os and that had successful business districts. Lower-income communities were powerless to resist clearance of historic ethnic enclave neighborhoods (Keyes 1969; Gans 1968; Greer 1965; Piven and Cloward 1997). Gradually, the federal government increased its role in assisting slum clearance by expanding a system of relatively weak, underfunded urban agencies. Elites actively targeted barrios for massive transportation projects and slum clearance projects. The need for major highways (located within the confines of targeted neighborhoods) was a convenient and “benign” public policy excuse for taking land and diminishing the geography of barrios. The dismantling of historic neighborhoods constituted a concerted strategy to destabilize existing cultural and social cohesion among minorities. This anti-people approach to slum clearance masquerading in the guise of

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redevelopment became know as the era of “people removal” (Anderson 1964; Jacobs 1961). An important historical factor in this “people removal” was that residents of slum communities had no administrative nor environmental regulatory statutes to which to refer in attempting to defend their neighborhoods (Hays 1987; Gottlieb 1993). The ruthless clearance of slums and barrios happened without any subsequent development to replace the destruction. Thus, communities suffered the dual indignity of being forced out of their neighborhoods without the benefit of replacement housing or economic development (Kleniewski 1984). The continual destruction of barrios also had a formative role in the establishment of radical political groups among members of the Chicana/o and Afro-American youth generation. Urban riots that occurred throughout the country were inspired by economic as well as political issues. Concurrently, the federal government financed programs and policies, such as construction of the federal highway system, deemed essential to suburban expansion (Perry and Watkins 1977; Checkoway 1984; Bullard et al. 2000). It also provided funding for massive new infrastructure to improve the quality and supply of water and solid waste management systems. Home mortgage tax incentives provided significant advantages to the banking, construction, and real estate industries. The historic suburban expansion and reshaping of land use patterns would not have occured without the largess of the national government (Jackson 1985; Fishman 1987; Checkoway 1984; Healy 1976). New suburbs were unconditionally dependent on the highway system, and, in fact, highways were the determining factor allowing the construction of these dormitory developments in rural and semi-rural zones (Jackson 1985; Fishman 1987). Another characteristic of the suburban expansion was the Euro-American homogeneity of its participants. Racism, de facto and de jure, that was rampant in the real estate industry precluded Chicanas/os from leaving the confines of the barrio. Home mortgage tax subsidies and infrastructure policy converged to underwrite the suburban expansion (Squires 2002; Kling et al. 1991; Gotham 2002) and, concurrently, accelerate the economic decomposition of minority neighborhoods. When small and medium-sized businesses began following their consumer base into the suburbs, urban commercial sectors experienced severe erosion. Thus, barrios and ghettoes lost jobs, cities lost sales tax, remaining businesses lost a substantial part of their consumer base, and communities lost cohesion in terms of the relationship between local commercial districts and residential areas (Sawer and Tabb 1984; Musterd and Ostendorf 1998; Meyer 2000). Mounting social unrest, inner city economic deterioration, the loss of political legitimacy, and the fracturing of society over the issues of racism and political empowerment finally forced the federal government and Congress to debate comprehensive strategies to address urban crises.

The War on Poverty In one of the most dramatic speeches ever delivered to the American public by a President, Lyndon Johnson announced that, economically, scientifically, educationally,

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and militarily, the United States constituted a “Great Society.” He touted numerous accomplishments that this society had achieved since World War II, including a thriving economy. Then he turned his attention to the crises of poverty (Dallek 1998), railing against a litany of social crises that included children without health care or adequate nutrition, unequal educational opportunities, overcrowded and unsafe housing, communities with terminal unemployment, urban crime, deteriorating cities, and the desperation of the poor. Middle- and upper-class Americans were unprepared for this blunt assessment of the condition of America. Rarely had a major political leader forced the gnawing problems of poverty into the nation’s front rooms. In chastising the narrow distribution of wealth and prosperity and acknowledging the economic ravages of racism, President Johnson announced that the federal government, through his leadership, would embark on a historic shift in public policy. This shift in policy would address ways to end the national disgrace of millions of poor citizens. President Johnson declared that American would mount a “War on Poverty” in a strategy designed to redistribute income and opportunity to all citizens (Dallek 1998). He promised that all the powers of the presidency would be marshaled to assist communities through a massive spending program designed to “lift up” lower-income neighborhoods, provide decent housing, educate “all of our children,” provide jobs for the underemployed, and address the urban crisis. Clearly, the President was responding to the urban unrest in cities throughout the nation and the political crisis of marginalized and underrepresented minorities. In announcing the War on Poverty, President Johnson committed an unprecedented level of fiscal support to cities large and small, and christened the second era of redevelopment policy in the United States. The War on Poverty was the most comprehensive urban revitalization vision ever proposed by the national government. The federal government established the Model Cities program through the Economic Opportunities Act of 1964 (Dallek 1998, 197). The main focus of this program was the reversal of the economic and social conditions of “blighted and deteriorating neighborhoods” in the country. The terms “blight” and “deterioration” would soon become contentious words in this war. Additionally, two progressive strategies were adopted to allow minorities to participate directly in the decision-making process for development. Cities were mandated to convene citizen action committees and to recognize HUD regulations that allowed local citizens the right to structurally oppose local government applications for federal revitalization funding. These two reforms ignited the first backlash against the president’s grand vision. Simply put, Euro-American elites who had, until this time, never negotiated any type of public policy with minorities were absolutely resistant to the federal government vesting marginalized minority community leaders with direct political power over disbursement of federal funds. The real war, a semi-permanent battle over the focus of redistribution policy, had officially commenced.

The Political War over the War on Poverty The President’s proposal was truly manna from heaven for city officials. Frustration with federal inattention to the urban crisis that commenced after World War II reached a

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crescendo during the era of urban insurrections in the 1960s. By this decade, the economies of central cities had passed crisis point and were in the midst of a vise of spiraling land values, crime, deterioration, and policy paralysis (Darden et al. 1987; Gillette 1995; Surgue 1996; Harvey 1973; Kraus 2000; Gorham and Glazer 1976). City officials could hardly wait for the legislation to pass to identify favorite projects. Unfortunately, economic destabilization and uneven development in minority communities were not among them (Feagin 1984; Harvey 1973). Congress passed legislation that focused on the substantive demand for federal support for urban renewal and that responded to criticisms of aggrieved minorities concerning prior redevelopment policy. Initial HUD regulations attempted to force cities to address the most blighted and deteriorated innercity neighborhoods and establish citizen committees with power over the direction of federal programs. In fact, HUD requirements mandated that citizens be given veto power over programs and projects proposed in their communities. This level of direct decision making was initiated to prevent the abusive practice of “people removal” from continuing and to increase minority political participation in local affairs. Of course, this mandated veto power incited controversy. Local officials were initially willing to “allow minorities a limited voice” as a tradeoff to acquire federal funding. Project area committees were designed to provide local residents with a major role in determining policy and course of action in regard to specific projects. Furthermore, these committees gave residents a voice in deciding which local applicants for CDBG funding would be approved (Kaplan et al. 1970; Gillette 1995; Keyes 1969). Thus, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, local elected officials and elites were “forced” to attend meetings where repressed communities had a voice. Though this voice was not equal, it was nevertheless powerful, and the policies that allowed it to be heard promised to help change the nation’s racist political landscape. However, local elites viewed this new development framework in a highly negative light and resolved to eliminate any semblance of direct political roles for ethnic minorities, especially over economic development. The racist legacy of local politics had to be preserved, not just in the South but throughout the country. The reaction from the urban cartel was ferocious. Elected officials complained bitterly to their congressional representatives, arguing that only elected representatives should control CDBG programs. What they did not state was their stark fear of a future in which marginalized communities exerted direct control over revitalization. These officials would get their wish when government restructured project area committees to the point that their role became merely advisory and returned final control over HUD programs to city councils (Moynihan 1972; Frieden and Kaplan 1975, 84–5). There was no debate over the lack of minority representation or how the “reform” would revert power to a repressive political elite. Once the power of minority neighborhoods was effectively diluted, the next major issue was to examine the seemingly simple definition of the term, “blight.” HUD required that cities identify blighted neighborhoods eligible for CDBG applications, while only vaguely defining this term. The term blight and the concept of what constitutes a blighted community is not a challenging intellectual exercise. HUD was determined to address the terminal deterioration of barrios and minority neighborhoods that demanded substantial reinvestment, both from the state and private sectors. It established threshold criteria to

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ensure that only neighborhoods that were actually blighted qualified for federally funded projects. Fundamentally, this strategy implied the need to identify resources in minority neighborhoods that exhibited signs of severe deterioration and decline. This conflict would have long-term devastating negative impacts on the future of revitalization of barrios and redistributive policies, a legacy that continues into the present period. The skirmish over the term “blight” is one of the most reprehensible episodes in the history of the planning profession. Planners and city officials were initially perplexed as to how to manipulate goals of the War on Poverty to benefit favored commercial districts while still adhering to HUD regulations. During the early period of the CDBG program, planners attempted to balance funding applications between barrios and commercial projects. This was problematic on two levels: first, the amount of funding required to address barrio revitalization was substantial and second, these projects, if approved, would not or could not meet their goals of housing production and revitalization projects, lest they jeopardize future funding. These officials and planners began to engage in “directed mismanagement” a process whereby the needs of barrios were consistently undermined by incessant delays or simple inaction. The strategic management objective was meant to negate and frustrate reallocation policy in minority neighborhoods while boosting CDBG proposals benefiting civic centers. One of the major problems was the substantial level of unexpended funds that were constantly re-budgeted into subsequent years (Frieden and Kaplan 1975, 228– 30). The rationale was that minority community programs were excessively burdensome and difficult to achieve. What was accomplished through this systemic delay in addressing barrio revitalization? The answer was a change in the conceptualization of the term “blight.” Local officials wanted to spend funds in favored economic development zones, and the practice of directed mismanagement served this goal by validating the supposed difficulties in actually implementing projects in barrios. Cities began expanding the parameters of project areas, linking deteriorated neighborhoods with civic center zones. Thus, blighted neighborhoods directly competed with civic center redevelopment projects for funding. Marginally declining commercial areas and civic center zones were grouped with adjacent minority neighborhoods in the same redevelopment zones and were thereby statistically legitimated as blighted areas. Gradually, the term “blight” was manipulated to the point of becoming meaningless. By the late 1970s most cities could blatantly declare almost any commercial district as being blighted and thus eligible for HUD programs. Without meaningful intervention by HUD, this charade of relabeling zones as blighted allowed cities to evade serious attention to deteriorated (truly blighted) barrios. CDBG funds were rarely used to address the supply crisis in affordable housing, to assist minority businesses or to support longrange revitalization in Southwest barrios. Once city officials won the war over the definition of blight, they turned their attention toward redefinition of income criteria in relation to affordable housing assistance (Hartman 1986; Solomon 1974). The original intent of the policy was that relatively straightforward, housing assistance be targeted to very low-income families. The president’s objective was to provide every family with safe, adequate, decent housing (Dallek 1998). The implication was that the lowest income households in the nation

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should receive the most benefit from HUD housing programs. In the Southwest and cities with significant Chicana/o populations, this assumed a major focus of the effort to improve the quality of housing in barrios. Development of affordable housing through direct housing subsidies to area residents was the cornerstone of the strategy to reconstruct the economic vitality of lower-income minority neighborhoods. The objectives included community stabilization through increased home ownership, maintenance of a strong, local consumer base, and a gradual increase in commercial and residential property values. For barrios in the Southwest, this framework should have resulted in an era of major new home construction, a significant increase in home ownership patterns, residual private sector reinvestment in the local housing market, and increased personal financial stability based on land value improvements over time. This should have also ushered in a new era of economic expansion to reverse a history of uneven development. These policy goals also implied that civic leaders, redevelopment agencies, and planning departments would be required to commit substantial resources to areas that had historically been discriminated against in relation to government services. The first major critique of the affordable housing strategy was the allegedly narrow idea that only the most needy, the lowest-income households and working-class families, should receive assistance. The main argument behind this strategy was that lower-income neighborhoods should have a mixed class structure, with both middle- and low-income families (Bratt et al. 1986; Wilson 1966; U.S. Commission on Urban Problems 1985). The HUD guidelines dictating that housing assistance be reserved for households with incomes at 80 percent or below the regional median income were deemed too rigid (Jacobs et al. 1986; Hartman 1986). Early critics demanded that a portion of affordable housing funds be allocated to incomes at or slightly above the regional median income level. The federal government, in maintaining a separate program for public housing that assisted very low income families, had hoped to develop a categorical grant program that would assist working families that needed a limited level of help to become home owners. HUD officials projected that, through this program, thousands of barrio families would receive economic assistance. The inclusion of middle-income households in the affordable housing strategy, while offering an optimistic vision of barrio class integration, was not intended to actually change the economy of the barrio. This reform constituted the first salvo to redirect local housing policy from lower-income communities to favored economic development zones. Why would the seemingly proactive concept of a class mix in declining neighborhoods negatively influence affordable housing policy? The reason was (and is) the fact that local officials were not interested in providing middle class housing in barrios, but were essentially demanding the opportunity to link housing with civic center economic development (Friedland 1983; Fainstein et al. 1983; Feagin 1998; Boyer 1995). The terms “middle-income housing” and “affordable housing” became synonymous in the lexicon of local housing policy. The concept of affordability had thereby become a neutralized, ineffective revitalization policy. City planners and redevelopment officials lobbied for an expansion of income criteria to allow households between 80 and 120 percent of the regional median income to qualify for federally funded affordable housing. Reliant upon the knowledge that the housing market in declining barrios had virtually no demand for middle-class housing, this shift in policy provided civic elites with the

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capability to build middle- and eventually upper-class housing within civic center redevelopment zones using HUD subsidies. This set the stage for conflict over housing policy, the location of actual need, and the misappropriation of funds meant for affordable housing assistance. When HUD acquiesced to this call for the expansion of income criteria for federal housing assistance, they, in effect, abandoned the front of the “War” dedicated to providing affordable shelter to needy families. By the late 1970s, cities were blatantly circumventing paying meaningful attention to the affordable housing supply crisis. They wanted to attract middle and upper income households through subsidized developments for households making 120 percent to 150 percent of the median regional income (Jacobs et al. 1986). Instead of providing an economic catalyst, increasing home ownership and improving land values in barrios in the Southwest, precious affordable housing dollars were lavishly appropriated for civic center development. The production of middle- and upper-classes was part of a corporate-dominated urban agenda (Sassen 1991; Neubeck and Ratcliff 1988).

Civic Centered Development and Trickle-Down Logic Once the skirmish over the framework of affordable housing was settled, cities began to apply it to economic development. Clearly, Johnson’s Model Cities program had intended that substantial levels of federal support be allocated to deteriorated and declining commercial districts for improvement of the barrio economy. Cities were encouraged to utilize CDBG funds for direct grants for business development and expansion, renovation of aging commercial structures, infrastructure, parking, facade and design, and other activities that could significantly improve the physical condition of commercial zones. By implication, Chicanas/os, historically excluded from the benefits of public expenditures at the local level, would become the focal point of economic development planning and redistribution. The urban cartel in the Southwest faced a quandary. HUD policy constituted a double historical negation: it implied that urban elites could not focus solely on favored commercial zones and that an excluded minority, Chicanas/os, were to be an integral component of local economic development policy. If the HUD strategy was to be pursued in good faith, “progress” in favored economic zones would be delayed. Redevelopment funds would be redistributed to areas in which elites had no confidence or any intent to revitalize. This dual dilemma of avoiding revitalization of barrio business districts while maintaining focus on civic centers led to a new explanatory framework. “Trickle-down economics” emerged as the “solution” to the public policy dilemma. This concept became the most effective mechanism or (in blunt terms) planning tool for reshaping the orientation of barrio revitalization in the Southwest. Trickle-down economics became the cornerstone of virtually all urban revitalization economic policy during the past quarter century. The conceptual framework of this term, as manipulated by local urban policy cartels, was that the success of economic development in central city locations would provide substantial benefits to the entire city. These benefits would trickle down to lower-income neighborhoods in the form of jobs,

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contracting opportunities and residual economic impacts (Feagin 1989). The veneer of trickle-down economics was in fact a thinly veiled denial of the state’s role in subsidizing real estate speculation and simultaneous failure to provide meaningful support to Chicana/o business districts. This was and is the policy rationale that reifies uneven development in barrios. In reality, trickle-down economics offered no substantive transfer or redistribution of money into barrios. Between 1970 and 1990, Chicanas/os were rarely the developers of major office buildings or retail malls in central cities. Minority landowners participated infrequently in major civic center redevelopment projects. Redevelopment officials normally used the power of eminent domain to force the sale of property, thereby transitioning benefit from Chicanas/os to Euro-Americans. Newly-constructed office towers and malls usually housed few, if any, Chicana/o businesses. Underwritten with HUD funds, corporate America (which controlled central city revitalization) had imposed a racist glass ceiling on mid- and upper-level management positions (Orlans 1992b; Dale 2001; Skrentny 2002). This ceiling only began to disappear in the 1990s. While central city redevelopment, subsidized by both federal and local governments, generated tens of millions in profits, how did it actually assist the Chicana/o community? The job opportunities created for minorities by this redevelopment were centered in the lowest echelon of the labor force: clerical workers, janitors, delivery service people, office managers, and entry-level professional classes. Thus, the effect of this residual economic benefit was minuscule. These types of positions could not possibly afford workers the means to become homeowners, increase local consumption patterns, or provide an economic catalyst to the barrio economy. There was neither an intent nor concern that any tangible direct benefit would accrue to lower-income communities by urban policy cartels. The term was utilized to “suggest” that barrios were part of the logic. Local elites, planners, and redevelopment officials coalesced to defend the “favored zone status” to the exclusion of most other declining business districts. Minority business districts, disadvantaged in this debate by racism and a history of limited political power, were effectively bypassed by the War on Poverty. Thus, during the critical early years of this period of unprecedented redistribution of tax resources for revitalization, barrios received only a trickle in financial support (Petersen 1981; Friedland 1983; Fainstein et al. 1983; Judd 1988; Fogelson 2001). In fact, in Pasadena and Tucson, barrios were devastated by the redevelopment process. The power of eminent domain was a convenient mechanism to disenfranchise Chicanos from any future economic benefit from redevelopment. This further destabilized the barrio economy, destroyed family wealth in relation to land ownership, and ruined established businesses. The central city strategy incorporated the installation of basic and vanity urban infrastructure. Cities began spending more funds on public art, street benches, urban facades, plazas, ornate brick cross walks and alleys, and wrought-iron ornamentation. Conversely, barrio commercial districts remained in a state of deterioration and decline. Urban infrastructure maintenance was wholly underfunded. Household income levels continued to lag significantly behind the regional median, limiting reinvestment in housing. Slum lords, absentee landlords, and land speculators continued to control substantial portions of barrio housing and commercial areas.

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Community Conflicts and Redevelopment Citizen advisory boards were established to change the brutish character of early redevelopment activities. Prior to the implementation of this policy, elites and civic officials had exercised absolute dominance over redevelopment. The idea of politically empowered, locally organized citizen committees was an alien concept for the political establishment, and local elites were intransigent about sharing any political power with minority representatives. Citizen advisory boards constituted a new role for Chicanas/os in planning and urban policy. Local city politicians initially perceived the mandate creating these boards as a quaint regulation necessary for qualification for HUD programs (Moynihan 1972; Keyes 1969; Pressman 1975). These locally elected and administrative elites, having previously dominated governmental function without any real opposition, did not anticipate the capability of minority communities to organize and empower themselves through this new program. Once community leaders began exerting their veto power, elites, the real estate industry, and redevelopment officials became determined to limit, eliminate, and/or circumvent this requirement that strived to equalize power relations. Eventually, local officials, with the approval of planners, began to manipulate the criteria dictating the composition of citizen boards (Moynihan 1972; Piven and Cloward 1972; Marris and Rein 1967). Many cities abandoned elected citizen boards and replaced them with appointed boards controlled by the political establishment. The only power that citizen groups held was that of reviewing specific projects or CDBG applications. Thus they were relegated to a position that was essentially advisory in nature. Planners limited citizen board access to information related to revitalization programs. This strategy of directed mismanagement neutralized the growing political influence of the community over to local urban policy. When the nature of this strategy became apparent, Chicanas/os began organizing oppositional movements to halt regressive redevelopment programs. The “real local” war on poverty was, by the early 1970s, fully engaged.

The Initial Chicana/o Social Justice Movements The controversy over the War on Poverty and redevelopment policy fostered a period of tension and political confrontation between barrio activists, urban cartels, and the planning establishment. The initial foray into the citizen committee process and its rapid decent into a controlled and meaningless forum forced Chicanas/os to find other avenues of redress. In Southern California, the earliest confrontation occurred in the early 1970s in Logan Heights, San Diego’s largest barrio. Community leaders engaged the local elite in a bitter war over the right to re-create a significant portion of the barrio that had been wiped out by a freeway into cultural social space. This conflict was mirrored in redevelopment battles in Pasadena and Tucson, and in a particularly aggressive, decade-long battle in San Bernardino. At its inception, the Chicana/o social justice movement lacked a basic understanding of land use and planning practice and the power of environmental legislation. However,

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activists received a rapid education in these matters through the ensuing conflict and struggle. Successful utilization of environmental review and HUD regulations were central in shifting the terrain of power in favor of the Chicano community. Although activists generally manipulated these regulations in a manner that was reactive rather than proactive, their actions were effective. The social justice platform advocated by Chicanas/os included the construction of affordable housing in barrios, financial subsidies for barrio commercial districts, improvements for existing structures, balanced redistribution policies between civic centers and barrios, and local political control over development projects. Activist efforts to oppose a freeway corridor targeting the western sector of the barrio in San Diego’s Logan Heights proved futile. The opposition coincided with the inception of significant environmental legislation (Hays 1987), but, in the mid-1960s, few minority communities were knowledgeable about the significant influence environmental logic would assume over land use policy. Despite losing the battle over freeway construction, local activists, with strong support throughout the barrio, determined to reassert local influence over space. Both San Diego and Caltrans (California’s transportation agency) proposed reusing the space underneath the massive freeway overpasses for public works yards. They viewed the area as a desolate, wasted urban zone that could only reasonably be used for parking trucks and vehicles, storage, and related uses. Already destablized by the negative economic and social impact of freeway construction (Anderson 1964; Levitt 1970; Jacobs 1961; Gans 1968), the community mobilized against any further regressive land uses in Logan Heights. Advocating a different, culturally-based vision of adaptive reuse, Chicanas/os in Logan Heights launched the first urban land use protest in the region (Villa 2000). The community of barrio Logan prevailed and asserted control over the space by creating a park with murals, recreational amenities, and a community center and day care. By the mid- to late 1970s, community activists in other cities started to challenge urban revitalization policy and manipulation of HUD funds. Some of the most intense political confrontations in the Southwest during this period occurred in San Bernardino, Pasadena, Phoenix, El Paso, and Tucson. In each of these cities, barrio activists engaged in major controversies over the political autonomy of the barrio, local HUD use of federal funds, legal challenges to the selection of citizen committees and use of redevelopment funding, local organizing, citywide political alliances and, eventually, utilization of environmental legislation as a strategic intervention to halt negative development project proposals. The specific dynamics of the confrontations in these cities will be discussed in a subsequent section.

A Different Vision of Redevelopment Policy A few cities viewed redevelopment as an inclusionary process in which community demands and benefits were central to policy. In these instances, the power elite acquiesced to equitable negotiation and community consensus building. The major difference between cities that created positive redevelopment strategies and those that had conflictive relationships with the community was the fact that, in the former instance,

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the community perceived that it would benefit from redevelopment. San Antonio, Denver, and Los Angeles’ suburban Pico Rivera all constitute examples of opportunities that most Southwestern cities failed to achieve during this initial era of urban renewal. San Antonio, Texas focused its redevelopment strategy on a traditional downtown business district model. The city’s commercial sector was in a severe state of decline due to deteriorating structural conditions. The area was characterized by marginal businesses and limited consumer activity. This area consequently suffered from a perception that it constituted the “seedy” part of the civic center. Under the leadership of the city’s first Chicano mayor of the modern era, Henry Cisneros, San Antonio adopted a redevelopment plan targeting the civic center. The area possessed a few assets, including a polluted river that meandered through the center of the city, a number of historic buildings, and a regionally influential economic role. San Antonio leaders focused on creating a river walk that they believed would attract tourism and convention activity. The first goal of the project was to address river pollution and infrastructure improvements. The city created a river-focused pedestrian experience on both sides of the water: one for commercial expansion and the other for urban open space (Arreola 2002; Rosales 2000). Parking, street furniture, building facade improvements, and financial assistance for building and urban design were the main components of the plan. The result was an attractive, pedestrian-driven center that substantially increased tourism and commerce in the area. The city also financed architectural improvements to the historic mercado, an area located in close proximity to the river front zone. Thus, two important anchors were enhanced to attract local consumer activity and regional tourism. These projects were the vanguard of the revitalization of San Antonio’s central city area. The city subsequently financed construction of a sports stadium for its professional basketball team, sponsored the highly influential annual Tejano music festival and initiated a citywide infrastructure improvement program. San Antonio is one of the most popular destinations for conventions and tourism in the Southwest. Tejano cuisine, especially fajitas, and Tejano music have become important cultural contributions to the regional economy (Rosales 2000). The city’s tourism industry is one of the most important components of the local economy, and, as such, redevelopment policy plays a central role in the economic recovery of the central city. Rather than suffering displacement, Chicana/o businesses were direct beneficiaries of the riverfront development plan. The city exhibited an inclusionary perspective from the earliest stages of the planning process. Through the 1960s, Denver’s barrios experienced a period of structural decomposition. Suburban flight had significantly impacted the city’s inner city economies (Clarke and Saiz 2003), leaving numerous commercial buildings derelict. The Westside barrio’s major commercial corridor, Santa Fe Drive, was a faltering zone, marked by struggling businesses that were highly dependent on the loyalty of barrio consumers. This linkage between residents and owners was the major point of stability for the businesses during this period of decline. Providing further hinderance to business activity was a destruction of a significant amount of barrio space for the construction of a college campus. This activism and informal business organizing led to the creation of a community development corporation in the early 1970s. The head of this corporation was a Chicana

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who had directed the Newsed Development Corporation (NDC). The organization confronted three barriers: a city government that had historically negated Chicana/o empowerment, a declining business corridor with limited resources to address a range of policy issues, and conservative feelings about gendered power relations. NDC focused on organizing the Chicana/o business community to develop consensus on a long-term strategy and also on lobbying the city for CDBG funding to initiate an urban planning process. The city’s mayor was supportive of community-directed project activities to address deterioration and blight. With strong local support and a technically proficient staff, the organization effectively lobbied the city. The development corporation prepared the first economic revitalization plan for Santa Fe Drive, purchased commercial properties, secured funds to renovate and lease their land holdings, and linked with the private sector to implement a major revitalization program. Changes in HUD regulations reversed the ability of NDC to own and control property. Thus, the corporation created a subsidiary, a for-profit development corporation, that allowed the organization to continue to explore opportunities in the local real estate market, develop an inventory of properties, obtain financing for renovation, and ensure a stable revenue stream for the long-term future. The city supported the planning efforts (Clarke and Saiz 2003) and, in the mid-1970s, allocated funding for a major facade enhancement project for the corridor. In addition, the city directed subsidies for existing or relocating businesses into the barrio. In conjunction with this project, NDC initiated a housing rehabilitation program, a community beautification project and a low interest loan program for prospective home buyers. This comprehensive community revitalization strategy linked neighborhood stability, home ownership, economic redevelopment, and infrastructure enhancement to address a range of barrio urban issues. By the early 1980s, led by the community-based corporation, the Santa Fe Drive corridor benefited from approximately $110 million in public and private sector reinvestment. Subsequent Denver mayors and city administrators have supported community-based solutions to urban issues. One important factor contributing to this continued support is the critical interrelationship between Chicana/o business owners and the NDC. From its inception, the NDC developed consensus and an inclusionary planning process to ensure that their strategy directly benefited existing business owners and that the long-term vitality of Santa Fe Drive was the guiding principle for redevelopment projects in the Westside. NDC is among the most successful Southwestern community controlled development corporations. By the 1970s, the major commercial corridor of Pico Rivera, California, Whittier Boulevard, was in an advanced state of deterioration. A majority of commercial properties in this neighborhood were either vacant or marginally active. The street, linked to East Los Angeles, was a depressing landscape of broken windows, peeling paint, worn signage, filthy sidewalks, and boarded-up storefronts. City residents avoided the area, so Whittier Boulevard generated scant sales tax revenue. With the street languishing in a state of disrepair, the image of Pico Rivera suffered. In the late 1970s, a limited level of new real estate investment targeted the city, due mainly to low market values for land. Increased home ownership inspired civic leaders to address the economic crisis of Whittier Boulevard. Pico Rivera was one of the first majority-Chicana/o suburbs of the post-World War II era, and the configuration of the local elite was multi-ethnic. Thus, Chicanas/os assumed a direct political role in the

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implementation of redevelopment policy. This level of representation in city councils by Chicanas/os was unique in Los Angeles county during this time (Valle and Torres 2000). The goal of this neighborhood’s redevelopment strategy was to demolish the entire south side of the street along a mile corridor. The city replaced decayed commercial buildings with a conventional strip mall, and commercial buildings were set back to maximize parking. In this city, the formula worked. The new commercial mall, anchored by mid-level clothing, appliance, and home furnishing stores was an immediate success. Increased consumer activity had a direct residual impact on private sector reinvestment on the north side of the boulevard. A number of small, Chicana/o-owned businesses, either with personal equity or low interest loans, significantly improved the physical character of their property. This was a period of unprecedented revitalization for the boulevard. Other sections of Whittier Boulevard, especially directly west of the initial redevelopment project, also benefited from this project. This area now constitutes one of the most important commercial districts and sales tax generators for Pico Rivera.

Transformation in Government Urban Policy In the 1980s the federal government recognized that the vast majority of barrios and lower income communities had not benefited from redevelopment (Wilmoth 1984; O’Connor 1999; Weir 1999). Concerned that employment opportunities continued to lag behind regional economic expansion, the government started giving incentives to businesses to relocate into lower income barrios. Federal and state regulations provided tax-incentives for three actions: (1) relocation into lower income zones, (2) employment of local residents, and (3) low interest loans and accelerated depreciation for manufacturing machinery. The adoption of this type of targeted tax-oriented reinvestment strategy was an acknowledgment of the failure of fifteen years (approximately 1967 to 1982) of programs implemented to “revitalize barrios.” The reality of persistent economic deterioration and underemployment had forced government officials to explore different strategies to achieve tangible revitalization. Federal officials recognized that under the political control of urban cartels, revitalization of barrios had not occurred, and so federal policy shifted to encourage Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) as a method to generate reinvestment and job growth. The logic of this strategy was to maximize profits for businesses willing to relocate into underdeveloped zones (Weir 1999). While this policy change constituted a different vision of encouraging reinvestment, it adhered to the top-down model of trickle-down economics. This tax incentive strategy attempted to redirect manufacturing industry into the barrio (Weir 1999; Wilmoth 1984). Labor-intensive manufacturing would potentially increase local job opportunities. The strategy also involved the creation of private sectordominated committees (Weir 1999; Wilmoth 1984) that assisted local government in designating areas for development, articulating local needs, and dictating types of job skills demanded by industry. Thus, private sector dominance over the process of redevelopment programs was solidified in this final effort to improve economic conditions in barrios.

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The primary failure of this policy was that the manufacturing sector was not motivated by its modest federal and local financial incentives. Relocation into depressed barrio economies required substantially higher subsidies, and the state was either unwilling or incapable of providing the level of funding necessary to attain the goals of the strategy. Though the period of PPPs included two successive programs, Enterprise Zones and Empowerment Zones, it failed to restructure economic conditions or relocate regional manufacturing into targeted areas on a significant level. The first program, Enterprise Zones, was an economic revitalization program developed during Prime Minister Thatcher’s administration in England. This program targeted communities that exhibited signs of terminal underdevelopment and historically high unemployment (Taylor 1998, 136–38). The goal was to increase industrial relocation into depressed zones, in particular the program targeted firms that employed fifty or more workers. The concept is that these types of businesses are large enough to be able to absorb new workers and provide long-term employment opportunities to distressed areas. The U.S. Enterprise Zones program, which mirrors that of England, is, like its British analogue, almost completely dependent on tax incentives and low-interest loans (Weir 1999). Participating businesses are required to either be located in a target area or to relocate to qualify for incentives. In return for hiring target area residents and providing them with job training, businesses were granted low-interest loans for the purchase of new industrial equipment (O’Connor 1999; Weir 1999; Wilmoth 1984). Other incentives were lenient zoning and environmental regulations and the development of businessoriented private industry councils (PIC). The PICs were designed to assist in the recruitment of businesses, link directly with schools to ensure a supply of workers with adequate job skills, to ensure control over the labor pool, and coordinate PPPs. Success of the program relied solely on job generation and long-term employment opportunities. In this sense, the program would address the dual crisis of underemployment and the lack of reinvestment. Communities would gain stability in the local labor market, increased job opportunities, locally-based consumer activity, and a reduction in state subsidies for unemployment. These are all issues that urban cartels had not been able to resolve in almost two decades of redevelopment driven reinvestment. The Enterprise Zones model created political spin for successive Republican administrations, but numerous analysts argued that the program was minimally effective (O’Connor 1999; Weir 1999). A major problem was that the actual tax advantage was totally inadequate to make up for relocation costs, program administration, and retention of skilled labor in these markets. The employee tax incentives were graduated, declining during each successive year of employment. Also, the program did not contain significant relocation incentives. While incentives for new equipment were a positive step, not every business requires new equipment to increase production capacity. As a result, most enterprise zones did not experience a significant level of business relocation (Weir 1999). In fact, the businesses that did benefit were already located in the targeted zone (Weir 1999), receiving tax write-offs simply for remaining in their current location. When the Enterprise Zones program failed to significantly impact industrial locational patterns, the federal government redesigned and relabeled the strategy. This technique of spin control is commonly employed by the urban planning profession to generate new momentum for tired, failed programs.

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The next evolution of tax-driven redevelopment was the implementation of Empowerment Zones. This program mirrored Enterprise Zones in that it relied on tax incentives to encourage reinvestment and relocation into under-developed barrios and lower-income zones. It was new in that it included funding for relocation; increased tax incentives for local employment, training, and retention; improved equipment depreciation; and further reductions in environmental and land use regulations. Again, these reforms had a minimal effect on industrial locational patterns. Businesses resisted relocating into declining neighborhoods with higher crime rates, a lower-quality labor force, and high insurance costs. Neither program has had a major impact on underemployment or has significantly changed reinvestment or industrial relocation patterns. PPPs remain influential in local redevelopment efforts. Increased private sector control has resulted in scant forums for meaningful Chicano influence over policy. The federal government (through the provision of massive tax incentives) and local government (through a relaxation of regulatory land use controls) have ceded substantial political and financial industrial development power to the real estate and manufacturing industries. In reality, the philosophy of trickle-down economics has been replicated in a trickle-down framework for the Enterprise/Empowerment Zones experiments. Placing dominant power in PPPs, administrators, and elected officials, this top-down model is a formal abandonment of the citizen participation model initially advocated by HUD in the 1960s. While these two programs are considered a new formulation of redevelopment, they have produced only limited benefits in the Southwest.

The Historic Impact of Redevelopment Policy on Chicana/o Communities in the Southwest Retrospectively, an assessment of the War on Poverty in barrios can only be characterized as a period of wasted funding and opportunity and a frustrating futility in relation to the efforts of the planning profession. The urban crisis in Chicana/o communities has been a constant reality since the establishment of the Model Cities program. Few barrios have experienced a substantial level of reinvestment and positive change. In fact, the most notable impact has been destruction of portions of barrios for redevelopment projects and/or major freeway corridors. Barrio business districts cling to life only with the support of the surrounding community. The structural condition of housing and commercial buildings in these neighborhoods remains in a state of decline. Barrio leadership has every right to question planners and the urban cartel and to challenge current policy. Why should the Chicana/o community support any further formulation of redevelopment policy? After forty years of massive transfers of tax funding, why are barrio economies relatively unchanged? When will planners and government officials formally admit that trickle-down logic has failed to revitalize barrios? Why is it that funding designated to produce vibrant and economically stable Chicana/o neighborhoods was used so ineffectively? Where was the funding targeting these areas expended? These fundamental questions challenge the credibility and legitimacy of both the planning profession and elected officials. If the future is only a repetition of the past, where does this history situate redevelopment policy?

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The lack of benefits to barrios is an appalling condemnation of conventional planning practice and the urban cartel’s false interest in the barrio economy. The results of forty years of redistributive programs are clear in the visual imagery of barrios, in the statistical and demographic data associated with these zones, and within the problematic socio-political arena produced and reproduced by terminally uneven development. While the dialectical conceptualization of the term “revitalization” is a mantra professed solemnly by the urban cartel and the planning professions, the bald manipulation of this word constitutes an open question in relation to the moral and technical validity of the entire policy. The abject failure of the urban cartel and the planning profession to substantially address the urban crises of barrio spatial relations, when given the advantage of four decades of hundreds of millions of local, state, and federal funds, is mismanagement at best and fraud at worst. In reality, the current era is a continuation of a history of underdevelopment characterized by a severe lack of affordable housing; economically declining commercial districts; acute problems with urban infrastructure; and limited economic gains, either in relation to job generation or business development. The underperformance of urban policy officials is as much a part of the crisis as the crisis itself. In fact, the Chicana/o community needs to question the primacy of planners and the urban cartel who, by demanding total political control, have in fact only functioned to exacerbate the crisis of the barrio. Their claim to legitimacy has no value. This urban policy failure has led to the failure of the ideology of redevelopment. Planning and policy failure have structural market and governmental costs. The market costs are related to lower land values, limited job opportunities, weak reinvestment in both commercial and housing markets, and de facto redlining in the banking industry. Society’s payment for failure is related to the era of expensive jail construction, increased demands for police and fire services, overloaded court systems, and administrative costs that all taxpayers absorb due to underdevelopment of barrios in the Southwest. The only socio-political context in which this failure might have been averted would have been if the urban cartel had viewed barrios as important components to local revitalization. Instead, barrios were historically treated as internal colonies from which to extract low-wage labor and high rents from dilapidated housing, and a demographic mechanism to convince HUD to allocate exponentially higher subsidies to cities, purportedly to revitalize barrios.

PART III Land Use and Politics Arena in the Post-World War II Suburban Expansion

9 The History of Confrontational Urban Politics: A Reliance on Social Movements In the modern era of urban public policy, which coincides with the Civil Rights movement and the War on Poverty, the main characteristic defining relations between the planning profession and the Chicana/o community was an acute lack of political inclusion. In coalition with urban elites, planners solidified the dominance of local urban policy cartels that actively excluded Chicanas/os from meaningful decision-making roles on land use, redevelopment, and planning issues. Through 1975 this exclusion resulted in regressive land use policies and uneven development in barrios and colonias. The history of urban policy in barrios is also a history of racism within the planning profession. Historically, most planners have taken a condescending attitude toward minorities, and the profession is dismissive of opinions on public policy emanating from barrio residents (Kiernan 1983; Medoff and Sklar 1994). The rational-functional planning perspective “intrinsically knew” what was “best” for the barrio, and Chicana/o community activists were deemed to be inconsequential (Rosales 2000; Gonzales 1993; Marquez 1985; Achor 1978). A few planners attempted to bridge the ethnic divide, but unfortunately those that solicited community involvement were made pariahs (Needleman and Needleman 1974) by a conservative planning profession. The advocacy planning movement established the first challenge to rational technical planning. However, this community-based approach to the planning process was met with resistance, repression, and sanctions. Many advocate planners were blacklisted and ostracized by their peers (Needleman and Needleman 1974). What emerged from this dark era of racism practiced by the profession was the initial stage of Chicana/o resistance to regressive land use and redevelopment policy. The legacy of the Chicano power era emboldened community leaders to directly challenge negative land use, transportation, and/or planning projects that did not benefit barrio residents. In fact, this history, which commenced in the late 1960s in the Southwest (Acuna 2003; Garcia 1994; Pena 1998; Lechuga 1987; Lopez 2002) directly refutes the conventional academic “discovery” of environmental racism in the late 1980s. Chicanas/os have been engaged in oppositional land use struggles since the 1950s and 1960s. The era of conflict stemmed from three factors: (1) the lack of political inclusion, (2) regressive revitalization proposals, and (3) the disparity in access to and the censorship of planning knowledge. Planners were initially shielded from the concerns and critiques of minorities via political exclusion, and this model of bureaucratic resistance to change served to suppress information through de facto censorship of basic federal urban policy regulations and community rights. Thus, rational technical planning was centered on a

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resistance to the transfer of knowledge to communities directly affected by the policies advanced by the profession. Community leaders, after initially trying (and failing) to gain access to the political process and participate directly in planning activities, developed locally based social movements to demand an equal role in shaping revitalization policy. The threat of litigation was one method to gain access to redevelopment and planning documents. Activists also challenged the unequal distribution of federally funded benefits. In New Mexico, Colorado, California, Arizona, and Texas, land use struggles were initiated well over a decade before the planning literature acknowledged their existence. Conflicts centered on spatial relations and community self-determination were the focus of this movement. In Tucson, Phoenix, San Bernardino, Pasadena, and San Francisco, intense opposition to conventional models of redevelopment policy emerged. In Denver, the Crusade for Justice was one of the first major organizations to critique the failure of city officials to address the crisis in affordable housing, lack of minority-owned businesses, the deterioration of barrio infrastructure, and overt discrimination practiced by local officials (Vigil 1999). In San Antonio, Tucson, San Jose, and San Francisco social movements openly resisted racism in planning, criticizing programs designed to intimidate and destroy the social fabric of the community. These social movements internalized an oppositional and a counterveiling force against regressive urban policy. Without recourse to the pluralist political arena, lacking knowledge of basic federal regulations, and experiencing hostility from planners, community leaders were determined to transform the politics of planning in barrios. They forced cities and planning departments to allow access to redevelopment documents and plans. Strategically, they utilized the courts and environmental regulations to support their contention that a racist logic pervaded over the entire spectrum of urban revitalization.

Racism in Planning The emergence of land use and environmentally based social movements in the Southwest is anchored to the virulent racism that characterized the planning profession during the early period of urban renewal and subsequently, during the initial implementation of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)-funded programs authored by the Johnson Administration. The inability of the planning profession to engage Chicanas/os formed the basis of this resistance movement. Advocate planners forced an internal confrontation to this racist logic, which essentially contradicted the ideological role of planning: the legitimation of the power structure to facilitate social control and suppress class conflict (Cullen and Knox 1981, 153). This defense of technical privilege reflected the broader contours of a profession that resisted acknowledgment of the legitimacy of barrio communities’ demands for change. Racism in planning helped to ensure the decomposition of barrios. The two most important factors were political marginalization (Cullen and Knox 1981, 153; Jowell and Millichap 1987) and defense of a Eurocentric “compatible management system” between business and government (Cockburn 1977, 18). The profession lacked the capability to change and reform itself, which was typical of other professions resistant to the inclusion

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of minorities (Doob 1999; Bowser and Hunt 1996; Browning et al. 2003). There was an acute lack of Chicanas/os in positions of power in bureaucracies (Finkle 1988). The planning profession exhibited a stridently biased Eurocentrism and a racially stratified bureaucratic structure. Civic elites, represented by planners, did not view barrio residents as important stakeholders in discussions concerning revitalization policy and the future of barrio spatial relations (Shockley 1974; Menchaca 1995; Vigil 1999; CayoSexton 1965; James et al. 1984). The profession often contradicted its own declared quest for a broad basis of opinions and achieving public consensus. When barrio spatial relations were the focus of land use propositions, conventional practice, which should have meant the incorporation of local concerns, was generally abandoned. This factor was a major rationale for the evolution of an internal opposition—advocate planners.

Conflict between the Chicana/o Community and the Planning Profession Racism within the local state had evolved into an intricate system of relations and functions that strove to limit accountability and thus the identification of failures (Kushnick 1996; Piven and Cloward 1985). Planning, at this critical stage, hindered the supply of funds to lower-income barrios. The lack of political inclusion precluded programs and actions that should have resulted in an era of reinvestment, structural revitalization, and the economic renaissance envisioned by HUD policy (Stone et al. 1979, 319–20). This assessment is centered in the conflict between civic center-based revitalization, designed to cater to urban elites, and policies that place the focal point of urban revitalization within lower income communities. In this conflict, the class biases of bureaucrats won out (Hamilton 1997; Harvey 1973; Feagin 1984; Cummings 1988). Consequently, the entire framework of policy debate centered on how to shift the logic of revitalization from declining neighborhoods into favored central city economic zones (Fainstein et al. 1983; Darden et al. 1987). Through the control of information, planners attempted, at first successfully, to intimidate minorities by withholding information on highly complex federal programs. If lower-income communities were to question why benefits from federal programs were not being routed to barrios and colonias, they would be at a severe disadvantage. In this context, discriminatory power relations were reified by professionals whose primary tactic was blocking the transfer of knowledge. This systemic practice appeared to be an indoctrinated response in defense of privilege (Seidman 1994; Darder 1991; Raskin and Bernstein 1987). The virtual exclusion of Chicanas/os from graduate programs in urban planning through the early 1980s (an issue that remains unresolved in numerous elite programs) reinforced the profession’s inability to value difference and contrasting visions of urban revitalization strategy. This also led to the dearth of Chicanas/os in senior government positions (Finkle 1988). Planners defined the urban cartel and real estate industry as their main clients rather than lower-income communities. Lower-income communities were stigmatized as an underclass with limited comprehension of the technical aspects of revitalization. Thus the socio-economic interests of the planning profession were aligned

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with the interests of capital (Wright 1985, 90), which in turn validated an ideology of exclusion (Rex 1988). Chicanas/os were generally excluded from appointments to major quasi governmental entities, for instance planning commissions and other civic boards. They were not offered opportunities to meet with city administrators, developers, and elected officials. When cities began to expand the membership of these types of entities, minority representatives typically lived in non-barrio areas. Defense of the rational-functional model of planning prevented citizen participation (Needleman and Needleman 1974; Forester 1989). The rational functional model values technical knowledge, expertise, and scientific rationality. Planners internalized that it was their purview to arrive at the best decision. Citizen perspectives were deemed a minor nuisance that were to be only modestly tolerated. This planning theory clashed with the self-determination demands of minorities in the 1950s and 1960s (Piven and Cloward 1972; Acuna 1996; Goldberg 1993). Not surprisingly, conflict between Chicanas/os and the profession was inevitable.

Advocacy Planners and the Internal Contradiction of Planning Fortunately, the planning profession was not totally monolithic. In the aftermath of the 1960s, a few younger planners attempted to shift the logic of the profession from a rational-functional model into an organic, community-based approach to planning. The fact that this movement existed is instructive on three levels: (1) some planners were committed to empowerment through the transfer of knowledge; (2) the repressive conventions of the profession were, finally, being challenged internally; and (3) the reaction against this movement validated the reality of elitism within planning practice from the 1950s through the 1970s. Advocate planners were a vanguard that offered promise for a planning profession that would engage communities as valid stakeholders within the discourse over redistributive policy (Davidoff 1965; Needleman and Needleman 1974). The fundamental goal of advocacy planning was to empower lower income communities. This vision of planning required a transformative restructuring of planning practice and the recognition that ethnic difference was not a negative social factor. Advocate planners were not fearful of difference or of an open discourse over the future of revitalization. Adherents to the rational-functional model would be forced to cede a level of power that had shielded the profession from minority community demands. This change, advocate planners assumed, would improve social relationships between barrio residents and planners and significantly increase the reallocation of resources to needy communities. While this perspective of planning seems relatively modest in the current era, it was controversial during this early modern era of planning. Advocate planners faced a host of negative sanctions when they proposed engaging minority communities via an egalitarian political and social framework. These planners suffered professionally and economically. They were denied promotions, fired from their positions, ostracized by their peers and, occasionally, blacklisted within the profession (Needleman and Needleman 1974). Their crime against planning was their philosophical support for the fundamental objectives of

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HUD—empowering marginalized minority communities and ensuring that federal programs tangibly benefited deteriorating neighborhoods. They adhered to the belief that redistributive policy should not inordinately benefit elites and real estate development interests. Local implementation of the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program should structurally improve the physical and economic conditions of barrios and ghettoes. The profession actively rejected the advocacy planning model. Advocate planners were forced into a difficult situation—if they persisted in meeting openly with minority community leadership they faced the wrath of their peers, but if they abandoned their belief in activist planning, they would also abandon their obligation to society. Many continued to meet with minority communities (Piven and Cloward 1977; Altshuler 1970; Aponte-Pares 1999), often during evening hours, outside city limits, at homes away from social settings, and over the telephone. Few planning directors endorsed the advocate planning model. One who did was Norman Krumholtz, who was Director of Planning in Cleveland, Ohio. He demanded that his department actively distribute information about its work to the public in order to include residents in deliberations concerning the future of redevelopment policy (Krumholtz and Forester 1990). Unfortunately, this was the exception to the norm. Senior planners in other cities repressed any efforts to transform planning. They argued that advocate planners would undermine professional primacy. Persistent demands for justice by Chicano social movements emerged in the early 1970s to challenge the dominant expert-driven model of planning.

Community Conflicts: Case Studies of the 1970s and Early 1980s Despite the way that the history of planning literature and social movements tends to render Chicanas/os invisible, barrios rose up in revolt against regressive and racist planning practices throughout the 1970s and early 1980s. That this history has been sequestered is a direct indication of the serious limitations of planning history. Racism in planning has had numerous effects: work place discrimination, exclusion from graduate programs, the repression of advocate planners, and demeaning treatment of minorities demanding access to both information and funding. The recent literature on environmental justice and racism, while welcome, has also served to submerge the significance of this history and the structural repression of barrio residents during the initial phase of the War on Poverty. The repression of history fosters stereotypes and mystifies struggles in which marginalized communities aggressively challenged local power structures (Darder 1991; Doob 1999; Katz and Taylor 1988; Bowser and Hunt 1996). Denying this history means not acknowledging the intelligence and sophistication of community leadership. But the planning profession has an extensive history of denial. Parenti directly addresses this legacy when he demands: “Who plans the planners? Who sets the goals at whose expense and for whose benefit become urgent questions. Within the existing politico-economic system, planning may actually increase inequalities and worsen conditions of workers and the poor, removing interest conflicts still further from the political arena and into the industrial-governmental boardrooms” (1978, 193).

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The political history of barrio resistance to the rational-functional model of planning demands a fundamental reassessment in relation to Southwest urbanism. Westside Homeowners and Tenants Association, San Bernardino, CA, 1976–1984 The most tenacious and sophisticated Chicana/o-led social movement against a racist redevelopment agency and city government occurred in the city of San Bernardino. This city, sixty miles east of L.A., has a history of racism and repression. The city government rarely consulted with minority leaders on public policy issues and bypassed barrio residents when making appointments to citizen advisory committees. The economy of the city had experienced serious decline since the mid-1950s. By the 1970s, San Bernardino was one of the most deteriorated jurisdictions in the region, characterized by extremely low property values in a period of regional expansion. This is also one of a few cities in the Southwest where racist urban form was entirely dominant. In typical fashion, CALTRANS (the state transportation agency) negotiated with city officials over freeway location and design. Civic leaders, in one of the most demeaning examples of spatial racism, recommended a design that placed all ingress and egress on the east side of the freeway. This eliminated any direct access for residents living in the Westside neighborhood. This is a rare instance of a freeway design that specifically limited access to an ethnic community. In this case, the civic center retained all of the benefits, while barrio residents had to drive into downtown to gain access to this route. In the mid-1970s, the city adopted a plan that declared the entire Westside neighborhood as a redevelopment zone (Lechuga 1987). This action ceded total control over future land use policy to a city that had ignored minorities. Minorities were not considered important interest groups in relation to urban policy. City leaders ignored resident opposition to the proposal. The community objected to the totality of the proposal, since every household would be subject to eminent domain. The minorityowned commercial district was planned for demolition. But no area residents were appointed to the project area committee. Local residents were essentially viewed as invisible non-actors without power. Residents not only resented this condescending mistreatment, they began to organize in defense of community control over urban space. During 1976, an early opposition group emerged. It established the Westside Homeowners and Tenants Association (WHTA), a multi-ethnic grassroots organization that specifically linked renters and homeowners in a united alliance. The leadership was committed to fostering and maintaining the political cohesion of all ethnic and class sectors of the Westside (Lechuga 1987). They focused their attention on the city’s recently-adopted redevelopment plan and the potential abuses deriving from the proposed demolition of certain neighborhoods. Another point of contention was the acute lack of community representation in the project area committee (PAC). They were concerned about the negative environmental and economic impacts of the proposal. To the city, environmental issues were a minor concern since the neighborhood in question was a minority area. WHTA initiated a series of demonstrations, generating strong attendance at public meetings. But the city ignored and/or devalued the comments submitted by WHTA.

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Throughout 1979 and 1980 the leadership continued the struggle, demanding local control over barrio revitalization. The city staunchly resisted, creating barriers to access of planning information and the federal regulatory requirements for citizen participation. WHTA eventually retained legal assistance and successfully sued the city, claiming unlawful interpretation of state redevelopment law in relation to the selection and composition of citizen advisory committees. In 1981, WHTA experienced its first political success. The result of the lawsuit was the first community-based election. WHTA won an overwhelming majority of the PAC, causing alarm and consternation among civic elites. The city attempted to invalidate the election (Lechuga 1987). For the next two years, the city claimed that the process was tainted, mainly because Chicanas/os continued to win a strong majority on the PAC. During 1981 and 1982, three elections were either challenged or nullified by the city due to overwhelming support for WHTA’s candidates. Finally in 1983, under threat of a court order, the city capitulated. In the last election of this period, WHTA won total control over the project area committee. The city was forced to accept a locally-supported PAC that strongly differed in its approach to redevelopment. The WHTA leaders adopted a community-based strategy for revitalization. One of the first votes was to abandon use of eminent domain in the barrio (Lechuga 1987), thus protecting the community from the worst abuses of the process. They endorsed a small-scale affordable housing assistance strategy to provide lowinterest loans to homeowners and developers of affordable housing. The strategy also targeted locally-based job training and construction firms, along with support for local business owners. WHTA’s willingness to confront a racist city elite and demand local control over redevelopment established a new political movement. San Bernardino did not expect an effective and tenacious opposition from the Westside. It never viewed the community as a serious political force nor possessing the ability to change the course of local urban policy. In the aftermath of this battle, city officials deferred to WHTA and the PAC when confronting the issue of urban policy and planning on the Westside. Few barrios in the Southwest achieved this level of total local control over redevelopment. Citizen Protective Action Committee, Phoenix The Citizen Protective Action Committee (CPAC) was formed in 1974 in response to the proposed expansion of Sky Harbor Airport—a project that essentially translated into the destruction of one of the most historic urban barrios in the Southwest, Golden Gate. The new airport master plan, which received approval from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), threatened to dismantle approximately 50 percent of the barrio (Dimas 1999). The city formed the West Approach Land Acquisition Project (WALA) to address concerns of area residents, mainly in direct response to environmental mandates emanating from the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969. Thus, the rush to transition land use from residential to a major transportation use was delayed. CPAC was created by barrio residents in response to unfair property assessments, the lack of comprehensive environmental analysis of the proposal, and the incremental level of barrio destruction which would have left numerous residents with devalued land and scant future prospects of appreciation.

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CPAC was among the first social justice movements in the Southwest to recognize the strategic use of environmental impact assessments to defend the barrio in a major land use controversy. Although the strategy resulted in the destruction of Golden Gate, barrio residents effectively defended their economic interests through a community-led effort to force the city to provide fair compensation and to address eliminating long-term economic harm to barrio residents. The Golden Gate barrio, located south of the civic center adjacent to the Salt River, was one of the oldest barrios in Phoenix. The barrio, a typical example of Chicana/o urbanism in the Southwest, was a segregated enclave characterized by declining housing conditions and an acute lack of basic infrastructure. Mexicana/o immigrant labor and Chicanas/os constituted the zone’s populace throughout the past century. One major urban amenity, Sky Harbor Airport, was built in close proximity to the barrio in the 1930s (Dimas 1999). During the mid-century, the relatively small regional airport was sufficient. This situation would change dramatically in the 1970s. By the late 1960s, Phoenix had become one of the fastest growing cities in the Southwest (Luckingham 1982), and the city’s airport capacity was extremely limited. In the early 1970s civic leaders advocated a substantial expansion of Sky Harbor. The Golden Gate barrio was the targeted area for this proposal. The city proposed to force the land sale of only the space necessary to accommodate the reconstruction of the airport zone. Thus, Golden Gate would suffer from plane-generated air and noise pollution as well as land devaluation. Moreover, the fracturing of the barrio would eradicate the ambiente del barrio. The perspective of a majority of barrio residents was that the city probably had the legal right, federal financial support, and power of eminent domain to enforce land confiscations in their community. However, they had a different vision of both expected benefits and the economic future. WALA was an ineffective civic entity, unable to comprehensively address the main issues related to the airport expansion proposal. The committee failed to adequately address relocation compensation or provide fair market value for forced land sales through eminent domain. On a strategic level, CPAC critiqued the plan and Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) in 1974 for failing to adequately address alternative sites in the region which would mitigate the urban environmental impacts of the proposed Sky Harbor expansion (Dimas 1999, 102). This intervention infuriated civic leaders who had never viewed any other suburban or semi-rural location near central Phoenix as a viable land use alternative. Once the city agreed to CPAC’s terms, the community organization approved the airport expansion plan. However, once relocation planning activities were initiated, major problems and doubts concerning the city’s ability to fairly implement the agreement centered on the lack of federal assurances for funding and future support for the proposal. Another organization, Chicanos Por La Causa, also entered the fray once this issue forced a reconsideration of the original terms of agreement between Golden Gate residents and the city. In March 1978, FAA officials notified the airport director that no federal funding was forthcoming (Dimas 1999,109). Thus, the controversy expanded and now involved CPAC and the city, the city and the FAA, and Golden Gate residents, whose relocation concerns were always in a secondary position and argued over by competing Chicana/o social movement organizations.

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CPAC, exhibiting a level of political sophistication unanticipated by civic elites, lobbied the Wilson Unified School District (whose teachers had also critiqued the relocation benefit strategy because of their own forced relocation) to strongly consider legal action against the city and the airport. This intervention proved effective in forcing the city to directly address how funding for relocation and land taking would proceed. The city agreed to a two-tiered approach. Financing for phase one properties would be allocated from general obligation bonds, airport fees, and federal funds for airline passengers. Additional funds would be generated from a major bond measure to be adopted by the voters (Dimas 1999, 110). This arrangement led to an tenuous alliance between airport advocates, the city, and CPAC. Once this bond measure was adopted, the Wilson Unified School District filed a lawsuit claiming a loss of land value to school district property. This action forced the city to accelerate the relocation process. With the tacit support of CPAC, the city, in the early 1980s, implemented a plan to purchase all of the land in this zone. Thus, while Golden Gate would be entirely destroyed, Chicana/o landowners would suffer neither a terminal loss of land value nor the substantial negative public health impacts of residing directly adjacent to one of the largest airports in the Southwest. Initially the city had developed a “…devious game with the barrio. It began secretly buying property in a haphazard fashion, had no regard for the resident’s property value, pretended to be concerned with only the safety of the residents…with little regard for the social, cultural, and economic implications of its actions….” (Dimas 1999, 112). CPAC, as the leading organization, effectively utilized the EIA process to defend the economic and political interests of Golden Gate. Although this translated into the eventual destruction of the barrio, city officials were forced to proceed on terms dictated by Chicanas/os. Phoenix had not anticipated this level of direct political intervention. Instead of half a barrio “surviving under the cloud of a permanent pollution crisis,” which would also have had long term negative economic impacts on land value, barrio residents forced the city into a plan that consisted of a fully funded relocation strategy, fair market value for land and, Chicana/o political empowerment over land use decision-making in one of the most significant urban master plans in Phoenix’s history. El Centro de Accion Social, Pasadena, CA, 1977–1981 The city of Pasadena has a long history of racism and repression of minorities. The Chicana/o and Afro-American communities suffered from social, political, and economic discrimination throughout most of last century. Up through the early 1980s, minorities were essentially excluded from local committees and city commissions addressing urban renewal strategies. There was occasionally a token minority appointment to a committee, but this did not provide any tangible power in the formulation of public policy (Moynihan 1972; Piven and Cloward 1977; Long 1966). The city’s rancid political history is exemplified by the personal history of Jackie Robinson. He adamantly refused to participate in any civic event in the city during his lifetime due to the racism that he, his family, and minorities more generally encountered. A particularly egregious example was international day at the Brookside Park swimming pool (within a few hundred yards of the famous Rose Bowl). Minorities were only allowed to swim in the pool on

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Wednesdays. In the evening, the pool was drained and cleaned for Euro-Americans, who used the facility during the week and weekends. Pasadena was from early on an elite suburb developed for upper-class families who relocated during the winter from the Midwest and the East. It became a flagship of civic racism in Southern California. Minorities were treated like serfs, and there was strict residential apartheid. Affordable housing and minority commercial revitalization were not deemed essential to the local economy. The first major battle over busing in California was the desegregation of the Pasadena Unified School District. The state of ethnic relations had remained in constant tension for over a century. The Villa Parke neighborhood, the focal point of this case study, was and is the center of the community. It is a predominantly Chicana/o and Mexicana/o immigrant community with a mixed housing density. During the era of this struggle, the 1970s and early 1980s, El Centro de Accion Social (El Centro) was the only nonprofit Chicana/ocontrolled social service agency in the city. The organization provided job referrals, social welfare services, and community advocacy. The city’s redevelopment policies reflected a civic center logic that essentially subsidized local elites. For instance, a city council member sold his property to the redevelopment agency, repurchased it at below market rate, and obtained a low-interest loan to build an office building. Voting on every measure related to the project, the owner’s/politico’s office was constructed a half a block from city hall. This was an example of business as usual in Pasadena. In the mid-1970s the redevelopment agency targeted Villa Parke as a potential area for gentrification. They viewed the community as a future location for middle- and upperclass housing for the central city. A range of proposals were developed between 1974 and 1977. Finally, the city adopted a specific developer and plan in 1977 (Espinoza 1989). The housing project would offer units priced at $85,000 in an era when the federal poverty level was below $9,000 per family. The plan also included a ten foot high wall surrounding the development. This exclusive and spatially alienating proposal would have significantly impacted future property values. The key issue was that no one in Villa Parke could afford a unit even though affordable space was in high demand. El Centro opposed to the plan from its inception. During public hearings, they protested that the plan would not benefit lower income households in Villa Parke. The design isolated the development from the neighborhood, and subsidized middle-class home owners (Espinoza 1989). These protests were dismissed by city officials who had historically dismissed the community as a nonfactor on urban policy-related issues. El Centro formally challenged the proposal in a letter submitted to the Los Angeles HUD office in 1977. When neither the city nor HUD seriously considered their comments, the leadership mobilized community support. El Centro educated residents about consequences of gentrification and the destabilizing impact on the affordable housing character of Villa Parke. Without administrative recourse, El Centro solicited support from the Western Center on Law and Poverty, which agreed to file a lawsuit against the city. This action initiated a three-year battle over the future of Villa Parke. (The author, during this period, was an assistant planner employed by the city.) El Centro’s intervention was not considered a threat by either city officials or the developers. They perceived that the organization was politically weak and that the city would prevail. The community was confident that the merits of the lawsuit would

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complicate the project for a minimum of two years, during which time the city might compromise. The city conversely was not interested in either compromise or negotiation. In fact, during the entire period of conflict, no planning director, redevelopment agency official or city manager met directly with representatives of El Centro. During the initial stage of opposition, El Centro, in assessing their limited political influence, addressed a range of scenarios in defense of Villa Parke. The leadership realized that with a narrow focus on Villa Parke, the city would probably overwhelm them with resources and political leverage. It was determined that a sole focus on the housing project would not succeed, even with pro bono legal assistance. El Centro developed a strategy to attack all major redevelopment proposals by the city for the duration of the struggle (Espinoza 1989). The objective was to engage the city in a longterm war of position (Gramsci 1978; Adamson 1980, 225), during which the cultural lineage of community would experience tangible results from its opposition and blunt the government’s hegemony over the economy and politics (Gramsci 1978, 96–8; Sasson 1987, 95). The strategy had two rationales: to force the city to reassign staff to other controversies and to deflect attention from Villa Parke. Opposition to the housing proposal would remain the main objective of the lucha, but El Centro was determined to critique any new redevelopment proposals by the city. El Centro submitted a series of critiques to HUD, both administrative and environmental, against Pasadena’s CDBG programs during 1978 to 1981. El Centro relied on both the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) and the stronger California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) to identify negative impacts and regressive land use planning. Initially HUD monitors supported El Centro’s critiques. They appeared to relish some criticism of the abuse of funding and projects. However, when HUD’s complicity in approving regressive revitalization projects became an issue, then the same monitors attempted to stonewall El Centro’s administrative and environmental critiques. A number of proposals—for auto malls, commercial corridors, and historic preservation zones—were critiqued by El Centro. The city had not anticipated a broad attack on its redevelopment strategy. The beginning of the end occurred between 1979 and 1980. El Centro developed political alliances with historic preservationists and anti-redevelopment activists. A senior staff member from U.S. Senator Alan Cranston’s office supported El Centro’s administrative critiques of the city’s CDBG program (Espinoza 1989). The Senator’s office had the power to demand that local and regional HUD offices fairly adhere to federal regulations and enforce sanctions against the city. In addition, El Centro linked with the Afro-American community, which was protesting the firing of a major redevelopment agency administrator and also demanding attention to the deterioration of Afro-American neighborhoods. El Centro submitted three successful environmental critiques against the historic Old Town redevelopment district to HUD. When each successive environmental impact report was rejected, city administrators and the planning department became increasingly infuriated. When funding was denied the third time, the city began to experience bureaucratic fatigue. The Villa Parke community, perceived as politically weak and insignificant, had mounted an effective challenge against the entirety of the city’s redevelopment strategy. Projects were being denied funding, HUD was questioning the city’s affordable housing

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strategy, and economic development proposals were being denied support. The Villa Parke controversy hovered over the entire process. El Centro’s strategy had significantly impacted the city’s urban strategy. Pasadena was confronted with a number of controversies—affordable housing, negative local reaction to commercial densification, continuing HUD criticisms, racism in hiring practices, and the rejection of funding for the Old Town project. HUD demanded administrative and environmental reforms, and froze all federal funding for a six-month period. The challenge from the community had seriously eroded the city’s credibility, threatening long-term sanctions. The endgame occurred in March of 1981 when the developer announced that the firm was abandoning the housing project in Villa Parke. This announcement was the first and only time the local paper, the Pasadena Star News, covered this controversy (Espinoza 1989). The city manager and redevelopment agency director were stunned. This was a major political victory for El Centro and the Villa Parke community. An underfunded nonprofit with a few staff members had outmaneuvered the redevelopment agency, the planning department, and a powerful regional development firm. The city had no recourse but to enter into direct negotiations with El Centro over the future of redevelopment policy. Gradually, the embedded racism that characterized Pasadena changed. By the mid-1980s, Chicanas/os and Afro-Americans began to receive appointments to a range of commissions and advisory boards, ending the historic resistance to political inclusion. By the late 1980s a truly affordable housing development, with over 70 percent of the units subsidized at prices community residents could afford, was constructed on the site of the conflict. However, unlike WHTA, El Centro remained on the periphery of power. Pasadena’s urban cartel continued its resistance to political empowerment and ceding barrio control over urban policy. El Centro has continued to assume the role of vigilant critic and occasional participant in a city that cannot escape its past. Communities Organized for Public Service: San Antonio Colonias are neighborhoods that are typical in Mexico. In the Southwest, especially in Texas, they are common. In them, urban infrastructure is typically poor. Numerous barrios lack basic urban systems, water, sewage, gas, paved streets, and recreational facilities. These normal urban amenities, seemingly universal in advanced capitalist countries, were not funded by local governments. The issue of inadequate and/or nonexistent infrastructure is a direct vestige of racist urban public policy in the Southwest (Wilson and Menzies 1997). This lack of infrastructure indicates the level of marginalization and repression of Chicanas/os in Texas. Indeed, the acute lack of allocation of tax resources in barrios y colonias is a method of directed mismanagement implemented to maintain under investment and structurally lower property values on a long-term basis. In San Antonio, civil rights organizing has a rich and inspirational history in defense of Tejano community interests. Conflicts over educational reform, the brutality of the Texas Rangers, and low-wage injustice are key components of the city’s modern history. Civil rights has been the core issue of political organizing in Tejano barrios since the late 1800s (Zamora et al. 2000). One of the major civil rights entities of this era was the

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Political Association of Spanish Speaking Organizations (PASSO) (Shockley 1974; Rosales 2000; Acosta and Winegarten 2003). Another organization that developed a community-based social movement was the Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF) (Cortes 1993). The foundation focused on empowering lower-income communities to deal with important local issues and transitioning leadership. These two politically-oriented groups operated in the context of emerging local demands for improvements in public services and the quality of life in barrios. The marked disparity in public services and infrastructure was a continual complaint in the barrios of San Antonio. Colonia residents suffered due to inadequate storm drains, flooded streets, and, in the worst cases, the loss of property. Residents became landlocked during major storms, unable to travel to work and school or to access emergency services. IAF in particular worked in communities whose indigenous leadership increasingly demanded that city government address the crisis of inadequate infrastructure (Cortes 1993; Acuna 1988). IAF activities coalesced on the key issue of annual flooding and the lack of a stormwater drainage system. The convergence of IAF organizing efforts and a nonexistent storm system led to the creation of a new social movement, Communities Organized for Political Service (COPS). This innovative organizing strategy was based on linking area residents with the Catholic parish system. Barrio leaders were trained to build on common social experiences important to everyday life. The linkage between churches and the community proved to be an effective method in establishing a locally driven advocacy group. The city’s initial resistance to implement a comprehensive program to solve this issue infuriated residents. COPS initiated protests and generated national press coverage that shamed nonresponsive public officials, who ultimately agreed to fund a new storm drain system in west San Antonio. COPS’ lucha was further rewarded when the state legislature adopted an infrastructure plan targeting colonias throughout the state. COPS remains a political and social force in San Antonio to this day. The Mission District in San Francisco, 1968–1975 The ideal of political pluralism—meaning equality of access among a range of interest groups (Dahl 1961; Bonjean et al. 1971; Parenti 1970; Gaventa 1980; Myrdal 1960)— never functioned for Chicanas/os in Southwestern cities except in one place—San Francisco. This progressive city, which had a mature multi-ethnic civic society, endorsed the logic that community leaders and organizations had the right to determine public policy in the Mission District. This is a distinctly different history, a scenario that other activists could only dream about given the broader history of racism in planning and urban policy across the region. The Mission District leadership developed inter-ethnic political alliances in the city. These relations, focused on electoral politics, provided Chicanas/os a level of control and access that no other barrio achieved during this era. By establishing strategic alliances with a number of County Supervisors, they established locally-controlled agencies for legal aid, art and culture, social welfare, employment, and youth services. The identity of the Mission was one of empowerment and influence. In the post-1960s era, local progressives demanded to participate in interest group politics (Castells 1983). By the early 1970s, the political terrain in relation to urban policy was controlled by local

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leaders. This leverage was exemplified in the conflict over rezoning proposals for the construction of the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) subway system. This operated directly below Mission Street and went through the commercial center of the community. Proposals to substantially increase commercial density, height limits, and residential densities had the potential to significantly gentrify the character of the Mission District. The Mission District, the historic Chicano/Latino barrio that evolved around Dolores Mission, had expanded into the southeastern sector of San Francisco. This neighborhood developed a unique cultural environment and had a substantial level of affordable housing; a strong, minority-driven business district; and, due to the Chicana/o public arts movement, public spaces with a clear Latina/o identity. The progressive political social movement supported the maintenance of the community’s residential character and defended affordable working-class housing. Community opposition to the demands of local property owners and the real estate industry evolved into a political defense of the area. These proposals had the potential to destroy the community’s social and economic foundations. The potential impacts would gentrify the housing stock and force minority businesses out of the district (Heins 1972). In addition, a dramatic change would also negatively impact the existing streetscape and urban social relations. The changes the real estate industry was demanding would transform the Mission into an alienating social environment filled with modernist structures. Access to the political arena proved critical in this land use conflict. The Mission was the only community in the region with political leverage to lobby effectively within the pluralist arena. Between 1974 and 1975, a series of public hearings commenced on the rezoning and densification issue. The conflict pitted real estate and land owners against local residents and small businesses. History suggested that Chicanas/os would not have any tangible political leverage in this type of planning controversy anywhere in the Southwest. In this instance, though, the scenario was distinctly different. Community-based political leadership prevailed. In an unprecedented barrio victory, the real estate interests lost before the Board of Supervisors. The Mission’s leadership exhibited an unprecedented ability to politically influence land use decisions and defend the spatial integrity of the barrio. San Francisco was the rare city in which Chicanas/os had the capability to assume power and influence over urban and land use policy (Castells 1983). This is the only example in which the normal exercise of political lobbying resulted in the government respecting a minority-centered vision on the future of spatial relations.

The Strategic Lessons of the Initial History of Chicana/o-Led Community Urban Conflicts The history of urban land-based conflicts in barrios and the social movements that developed in response to racism in planning and local urban policy eventually forced civic elites and the profession to reassess the function and practice of city planning. EuroAmericans now had to internally address their own history of unequal distribution of resources (Pickvance 1976; Smith and Feagin 1987; Cummings 1988; Harvey 1973;

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Gottdiener 1985). Barrio leaders advocated a different vision of spatial relations that challenged planning on a number of levels. The planning profession was embedded in protecting a rational-functional model for control over maintenance and management of the city (Harvey 1985; Miliband 1983). This defense of status quo power relations acted to maintain the marginalization of oppositional forces (Block 1987). Minority leaders were viewed as dangerous interlopers without legitimate planning knowledge of policy development. The challenge to the urban policy cartel ushered in both a new reality in the practice of planning and demands for an unprecedented level of empowerment and inclusion. Thus, the urban cartel’s resistance to change mandated that Chicana/o leadership utilize a range of strategies to challenge a political arena in which planning practice devalued locally developed solutions to the urban crisis of barrios. Community leaders filed lawsuits and administrative complaints to HUD, organized grassroots support, converted public hearings into political rallies, and openly disparaged civic leaders during this era. A major goal was to insure that barrio residents had direct influence on public policy related to their neighborhoods. Urban cartels were forced to acknowledge different urban revitalization programs that questioned the fundamental precepts of the top down, physicalist planning model. This history also undercuts a logic that has excluded Chicana/o social actors in the literature and history of planning. These social movements comprise a history of land use activism that has been effectively devalued in planning. The profession, in limiting discourse on oppositional movements in the Southwest, effectively fostered a sense of denial that filters current policy discussions regarding land use policy and barrios in the United States. Addressing racism forces a necessary reassessment of planning’s history, the purported goals of public policy, and the faint voices of advocate planners from the 1960s and 1970s. A profession that is responsible for ensuring civic participation cannot ignore revisiting an era in which these seemingly normative approaches to pluralist democracy were negated due to elitism and racism. Social justice movements in this region, based on conflicts over spatial relations, are central to this reassessment. Community-based leadership was important because it allowed neighborhoods the ability to maneuver through a terrain of power in which they had a distinct disadvantage in relation to planning knowledge, funding, and political influence. Local leaders had to develop strategies without access to information and with a limited comprehension of planning and redevelopment practice. Barrio residents had to comprehend the issues being contested, develop proactive urban platforms, and exhibit courage in challenging racist urban cartels. Oppositional visions of what constitutes social space in a culturally defined community has perpetually complicated how elites attempt to control ethnic difference (Lefebvre 1991a; Gottdiener 1985; de Certeau 1997). The contentious conflict over redistribution coincided with maintaining political marginalization that is a cornerstone of ethnic relations in this society. Barrio leaders advocated a reassessment and redefinition of urban policy, from one basic vantage point: who actually benefits from urban revitalization? This question is the most fundamental aspect of this entire history. In a proactive context, leaders of these movements demanded local control over revitalization policy and direct benefits for

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lower income households. Conversely, the defense of community was a reactive lucha designed to protect the barrio’s built environment and its rich social culture from destruction or gentrification. Thus, protest and oppositional movements confronted a society fearful of addressing difference in an egalitarian fashion (Bowser and Hunt 1996; Davis 2000; Young 1990). Among planning elites, marginalization within planning was preferable to the alternative—barrio control over millions of dollars in HUD funding to address deterioration and blight. The destruction of community by urban cartels as a “solution” to social problems has been a continual flashpoint of conflict (Gans 1968; Hartman 1974; Anderson 1964). Opposition to the destruction of barrio space or policies that would regressively restructure spatial relations formed a potent focal point for political organizing. The insensitive implementation of eminent domain in minority communities is one of the most fundamental legacies of the planning profession during that era (Kaplan et al. 1970; Marris and Rein 1967; Frieden and Kaplan 1975). Locally-based leadership-linked community defense against the destruction of barrio socio-cultural space with an aggressive political strategy to challenge plans that would dismantle community character. This political challenge incorporated a structural critique of the civic center redevelopment logic. Elected officials, local elites, and the real estate and development industries were the main beneficiaries of this strategy. The planning profession, at the center of this policy, was thereby viewed with mistrust (Comisso 1986; Cox 1978). The critique of the abuse of a top-down model exposed the contradictions of an urban cartel that viewed federally funded programs in a narrowly defined, self-serving manner. Minority demands for federal oversight and enforcement of regulations was one response to this. Community leaders typically had limited knowledge of specific regulatory and legislative mandates. A significant number of cities were in noncompliance with HUD regulations (Frieden and Kaplan 1975), and when barrios demanded that cities produce evidence that their goals and priorities had been met, planners and city managers attempted to evade comprehensive review of their past performance. The issue, related to the production of affordable housing, was a particularly blatant abuse of HUD regulations (Bratt et al. 1986; Weiss 1985; O’Connor 1999). Chicana/o social movements also began to aggressively utilize NEPA, EPA, and environmental impact assessment criteria to critique projects. In California, CEQA legislation, which is more comprehensive than NEPA, provided social movements increased leverage in opposition to regressive projects. The use of environmental logic during this era, significantly predates current literature on this issue. The Golden Gate barrio in Phoenix is a prime example of the impact of environmental logic within the framework of early social movements. El Centro and WHTA both effectively used environmental impact analysis within the context of their respective oppositional strategies. Two other arenas were used to attack local redevelopment strategy: the selection process for citizen advisory committees and the court system. The selection process for citizen committees was among the most manipulated aspects of HUD programs (Moynihan 1972; Piven and Cloward 1977). City officials appointed docile representatives who would not oppose programs. Community leaders bitterly criticized

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this overt manipulation of the community representation process. These social actors relied on the court system alleging failure to adhere to a range of federally mandated regulations and laws. By the end of this era, community organizations viewed the courts as one of the few avenues available to address equity in planning and racism in redevelopment policy. This era of community-based social movements was centered on an oppositional consciousness, a counterveiling force against the hegemonic economic power within public policy (Offe 1990; Katznelson 1981). By accessing information and technical knowledge, especially environmental impact analysis and affordable housing policies, social movements transformed power relations. The newfound power accompanying access to information was critical to highlighting how planners had abused their power (Young 1990, 89; Schlosberg 1999; Gottlieb 1993). Finally, the lack of minority access to public information came to be viewed as a key manifestation of racism. The denial of equal access meant maintenance of repressive power relations. Once this barrier was shattered, the role of planning and the power of urban policy cartels were exposed, technically and politically, as existing solely to preserve power and control over federal revitalization funding. The reform of the planning profession has been painfully slow. The legacy of advocate planners, offering hope and promise, was squelched at a critical juncture when a new vision of planning was required to address changing political, social, and economic circumstances. Critical to this period was the achievement of a major objective of the advocate planning philosophy, the transfer of planning knowledge to marginalized communities. The access to information was pivotal in the eventual successes of these social movements. In the current era, planning practice that includes providing translated material, meeting with interest groups, and listening and responding to criticism are considered ideal (Hoch 1994). The profession, in defense of an old logic, delayed history and destroyed trust within Chicana/o communities for decades while protecting the status quo. Despite the progress made, a persistent glass ceiling in senior management in planning departments remains, and this ceiling has been detrimental to achieving an egalitarian planning framework. The new social movements attacked rational functional planning traditions and their exclusionary approaches to ethnic relations. The optimistic hope was structural reform in both redistribution policy and within the bureaucracy. Yet even with all the progressive changes of the past three decades, old ways die hard. Barrio social movements continue to challenge rational-functional planning departments and local elites over the direction of urban policy.

10 The Politics of Environmental Justice in the Southwest The history of regressive land use and planning policy in barrios has hindered the economic and public health conditions in the Southwest and other regions. In lieu of developing and implementing policies to improve the quality of life, communities have been constantly forced into positions of resistance against regressive urban projects. It is a history of wasted time, wasted money, and the withering away of the concept of community by policies which assume that uneven development is the norm within the barrio economy. A major land use crisis has resulted from permitting the location of industrial zones and/or toxic materials in direct proximity to barrio residential zones and schools (Bullard 1994). Manufacturing zones adjacent to barrios pollute ground water, contaminate soil, and emit heavy particulates that negatively impact public health in barrios (Bullard 1994; Pena 1997). While environmental policy has improved, the legacy of this regressive land use relationship persists to the current era. For instance, in Los Angeles, some elementary and middle schools have had inordinately high levels of cancer-related illnesses and death. Cancer-related deaths have been attributed to the siting of schools on former manufacturing sites or next to existing industrial zones. (School district officials and public health agencies steadfastly deny any correlation between young children dying from cancer and school location policy.) Numerous communities suffered constant spatial restructuring because of the demands of regional elites for new transportation systems and their need to meet economic growth objectives. This eminent domain strategy has led to the destruction of innumerable Chicana/o neighborhoods for interstate corridors. During the early post-World War II period, in which the federal highway administration funded a new national highway transportation system (Anderson 1964; Lewis 1997), dense inner-city barrios were often prime corridors. This ensured the continuation of social, economic, and spatial destabilization. One barrio in particular, historic East Los Angeles (East L.A.), was especially hard. There, the state of California constructed corridors for five separate freeway systems. This was the most intense level of community destruction by transportation policy in the history of the United States. In an era prior to environmental legislation, community leaders in East L.A. were defenseless in halting the destruction of dozens of cohesive, historically significant neighborhoods. However, in the 1970s Chicana/o activists began demanding environmental justice. But since they often lacked knowledge of federal urban policy, environmental laws, and basic planning practice, the initial demands focused on political objectives. The role of environmentalism in Southwest barrios during this era was devalued by mainstream planning and environmental organizations. The perception of the

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profession was that environmentalism was a middle-class and Euro-American issue (Gottlieb 1993). Initially, environmental analysis in minority communities was demeaned as an obstructionist tactic, not a serious effort to resolve serious environmental crises. Environmentalism and barrios were deemed mutually exclusive by planners. The literature on planning only began to focus on this conflict in the late 1980s. But the environmental justice movement, in fact, predates planning’s own acknowledgment of the issue. When a small group of women in East L.A. engaged in a struggle in the late 1980s against the location of a prison near a barrio, it was not a new form of activism. They were initially unaware of how influential environmental impact analysis reflected the experience of numerous other urban social movements. Their position within the pluralist arena as marginalized minority women without financial or technical resources was also not dissimilar to the political reality of Chicanas/os. What was different was that the Mothers of East Los Angeles or Las Madres de Este Los Angeles (MELA) entered into the realm of urban planning discourse under the labels “environmental justice” and “environmental racism” (Russell 1989). Environmental racism was not “a new type of racism in late twentieth century.” This Euro-American “discovery” was just another form of intellectual racism characteristic of the class privilege of the planning profession. Activists had long encountered entrenched elites dismissive of their demands for improvements in barrio quality of life. What had changed, only gradually, was an admission within the literature that Chicanas/os were significant social actors in the battle over environmental protection in major metropolitan areas. “The specificity of social action lies in the fact that it is always analyzed in terms of unequal social relations (power, domination, influence, authority). But social relations are never completely ‘open’…social relations and orders are constantly undergoing a process of change” (Touraine 1988, 70–71). Thus, this history is informative on two levels. The most important, the one that remains essential in reexcavating urban history, is the profession’s denial of a Latina/o social movement that began in the late 1960s. This history leads to the second level, the recognition that marginalized social sectors, lowerincome Chicanas, had the capacity to effectively assume the mantle of environmental activists. Spacio-political conflicts were not confined to older zones like the historic East L.A. barrio. Chicanas/os in Wilmington (near the L.A. harbor), a community located in the middle of the most intensive oil refining and petrochemical manufacturing zones in Southern California, began fighting the Southern California Air Quality Management District (AQMD) over the complete lack of attention paid to public health relating to discharges of toxic emissions, fires, and petrochemical disasters in the area. Land conflicts in New Mexico addressed access to resources, mainly water rights, and land title issues (Pena 1997). Poisonous air pollution in the southern Rio Grande Valley of Texas, and the resultant tragedies of severe birth defects and premature infant deaths (Pinkerton 1993; Nusser and Haurwitz 1995), increased environmental justice demands along border communities negatively impacted by the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the rapid expansion of maquiladora zones (Pinkerton 1993; Nusser and Haurwitz 1995). The Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice (SNEEJ) has been and remains a major force in addressing toxic issues and lobbying for pollution reduction adjacent to numerous barrios in New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona (Marquez 1998). In

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another major lucha, a cross-border coalition in the El Paso-Juarez region has fought to halt a high-level radioactive and toxic landfill in Sierra Blanca. This proposal would locate it in a desert area, adjacent to the Rio Bravo and other significant regional aquifers. Initially ignored by state agencies on both sides of the border and regional officials, this environmental movement has effectively addressed the proposal’s numerous, long-term negative impacts on regional water sources. The intersection of environmental protection and barrio spatial relations forced planning to acknowledge systemic policy mismanagement. The urban policy cartel remains suspicious and unrepentant in the discourse linking environmental protection and Chicanas/os. This racism in planning policy is directly related to the gross disparity in how Euro-American neighborhoods are situated in this discourse vis-à-viz colonias in the Southwest. The results continue to inform and organize barrios to resist a legacy of uneven development in which the worst environmental abuses occur disproportionately in lower-income barrios.

Land Use Conflicts in Barrios Numerous minority residential zones are adjacent to industrial areas and/or landfills that contain high levels of toxic pollution and airborne contaminants (Bullard 1994; Lee 1987). This type of locational conflict is associated with class and ethnicity (Bullard 1990; Lee 1987). The convergence of land uses that permit high levels of pollution near residential areas, normally a relationship that conventional planning views as incompatible (Hopkins 2001), exists in numerous cities in the region. The Mexico-U.S. border is another environmentally contested terrain. The rapidly expanding environmental crisis along the border zone is a consequence of rapid industrialization and urbanization, which has overwhelmed the regional infrastructure (Herzog 1990; Pena 1997). Why is there a prevalence of incompatible land use and zoning policies in minority communities? What normative planning policies were ignored? What sectors, if any, within planning attempted to prevent this type of negative land use? Why hasn’t the profession actively intervened to mitigate and resolve these conflicts? The fact that these issues exist is particularly disturbing because Southwest urbanism has pioneered the strict separation of land uses. The social production of quality of life, and which classes benefit, are at the center of this controversy. The logic of environmental justice challenges why quality-of-life issues are not major concerns in barrios. Industrial zones are the most common incompatible land use impacting barrios. Cities have allowed residential construction directly adjacent or in close proximity to manufacturing areas. They often suffer from toxic emissions, severe soil contamination, and ground water pollution, along with onsite storage of toxic materials and volatile industrial wastes. Another factor is a high level of truck traffic, which transports toxic and industrial pollutants through residential neighborhoods. There are currently only limited regulations governing diesel emissions, which increase smog in cities such as Houston and Los Angeles. Some historic barrios were also the location of burgeoning industrial development. The modern barrios of Albuquerque and Los Angeles were located in industrial zones. In the 1910s and 1920s the main Los Angeles barrio was in the industrialized eastern area of

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the civic center. In this mixed industrial and residential “community,” trucks, factories, and markets merged into one zone. When Chicanas/os migrated east across the Los Angeles River, industrial uses also moved into the Eastside. The industrial zones were along the river’s eastern fringe and along Olympic Boulevard, a major east/west arterial corridor. Residential uses were permitted across the street and occasionally within the industrial zone. In Albuquerque, two barrios that date to the nineteenth century, Barales and San Jose, were targeted as industrial zones in the early 1900s. During the city’s modern expansion, economic elites introduced industrial factories into these historic Chicana/o communities. The city tolerated residential and industrial sites without any consideration of the longterm negative impacts on the community. Eventually, South Barales was demolished through urban renewal to create an industrial land bank to attract economic activity into the city. The Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) is under public scrutiny for locating some schools on former industrial sites or next to existing manufacturing uses (Gittrich 1999, 2000; Hardy 1999). A number of cancer-related illnesses and a few deaths have occurred at schools built near or on top of toxic hazards. Cancer-related deaths among elementary-aged children, along with teachers and administrators, have occurred at schools directly adjacent to manufacturing zones. LAUSD has steadfastly denied any correlation between toxin-laced campus playgrounds, which have yet to be remediated, and illnesses among young children. Parents have organized protests to challenge the district’s denial of responsibility in this matter. In fact, the district had continued a policy of seeking cheap industrial land in minority neighborhoods in spite of past problems. The district purchased one industrial site without fully addressing the level of toxic and industrial pollution. A manufacturing worker in the area indicated that “This area is fine for us, for the foundries and the warehouses. But who would have ever thought of using this for a school? It’s been industrial for at least 40 years. You want to send your kid to a factory site to go to school?” (Newton 1999). Another worker in the area stated in disgust, “Send my kids to school there? Over my dying ass” (Newton 1999). Recent elections changed the composition of the school board and this site was abandoned. However, this is only one instance of rationality. There are numerous sites that demand remediation that have not been addressed. Several suburban communities in Los Angeles county with a substantial Chicana/o populace are located near industrial areas. This is most pronounced in the central San Gabriel Valley (east of L.A.). Four cities, La Puente, Baldwin Park, Industry, and Irwindale, all exhibit five key characteristics: (1) they have predominantly Chicana/o populations; (2) they allow heavy manufacturing near residential zones; (3) they are poor; (4) they have no buffers separating residential from industrial zoning; and (5) they have rarely been the subject of environmental impact studies. This residential/industrial zone has direct negative public health consequences for local residents. These cities had the opportunity in the 1950s and 1960s to develop policies to limit—if not eliminate— incompatible land use conflicts, but essentially ignored the looming public health crisis. Two small rural Californian cities, Casmalia and Macfarland, have major landfills that are licensed to receive toxic industrial waste. These communities are predominately Chicana/o, with agriculture the major industry. In these desolate rural locations, urban

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waste has created a public health nightmare in barrios. Both cities have experienced inordinately high levels of cancer-related illnesses and deaths, especially given their rural character. Neither the cities nor the landfill operators acknowledge any correlation between heavily toxic landfills and cancer-related public health problems in neighborhoods adjacent to the sites. The crisis in Casmalia and Macfarland did not suddenly emerge. Barrio residents had experienced cancer-related illnesses for a few decades. With mounting deaths and illnesses, especially among teens, parents became frustrated with their inability to force either the state or their respective cities to address the crisis. Then they organized and linked with regional and state environmental organizations to plead their case in the media. Finally, with public pressure and effective lobbying in coalition with environmental organizations, the state was forced to act. The fact that landfills were constructed without liners and toxic waste was leeching into local aquifers convinced authorities to eventually close one site. In south Texas, the problem of improper land use planning has also negatively impacted numerous colonias. These problems exist along the border, in rural communities, and in urban barrios. In Sierra Blanca, Texas proposed a major industrial toxic waste site that had the potential to threaten the entire water system for the El Paso and Juarez region (Vasquez-Castillo 2001). The state was interested in finding a rural location with limited political power to oppose the project. But a bilateral communitybased opposition developed that eventually forced the state to abandon the proposal (Vasquez-Castillo 2001). The South Valle experienced a tragic sequence of cancerrelated illnesses and birth defects due to the acute lack of monitoring of illegal transborder shipment of toxic industrial wastes from the United States to Mexico. The practice of trash burning to reduce the volume of waste in Mexico ironically returned the toxic materials to Texas with deadly impacts. Burning toxic wastes with trash created a toxic plume, that—given regional wind patterns—recrossed the border and deposited toxic particulates in communities just north of the frontera. In MacAllen, Laredo, and other communities this created a major public health crisis (Pinkerton 1993).

Federal Highway Policy and Restructuring Spatial Relations in East Los Angeles Federal highway legislation and California state transportation policy converged in the 1940s and 1950s to negatively impact the barrios in East Los Angeles. The regional expansion of Southern California was predicated on a comprehensive transportation grid that met the demands of a rapidly growing economy (Gottlieb and Wolt 1977; Fogelson 1967; Starr 1990). Designing this system was not difficult, given the low scale density of that era, except in one area, central Los Angeles. The civic center, which dominated economic, social, political, and cultural relations, was viewed as the permanent anchor to the future. Thus, all transportation systems were oriented toward downtown. The location of major freeway systems in central Los Angeles was problematic, however. Elite neighborhoods were located south and west, with working-class communities north and east of the civic center. The conflict stemmed from trying to avoid the destruction of

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important civic center, economic, and residential zones while insuring that the regional transportation system traversed through this same civic center. Transportation planning in the region is intricately tied to the issue of environmental justice in minority communities. The first major zone dismantled by transportationrelated construction was the original Chinatown (Nelson 1983). The destruction of this community was deemed essential for the construction of Union Station, the main train center for the region. When this early planning and transportation project destroyed a vulnerable minority area in the 1930s, a pattern was established that would have significant negative consequences for East Los Angeles two decades later. The treatment of Asians was an early example of how planning and urban policy regarded minority communities. The demand for a new regional and interstate system evolved into a strategy of identifying corridors in marginalized communities. Thus, regional and state transportation officials, in viewing the urban geography of Los Angeles, revisited the history of Union Station to determine how to confiscate space and rupture socially cohesive neighborhoods in order to achieve “socially beneficial public policy goals.” In planning for a system ringing downtown, transportation planners viewed East Los Angeles as the zone that would “accommodate” a significant portion of new freeway construction. During the next three decades, East Los Angeles experienced a seemingly endless succession of state-imposed freeway corridors (Penalosa 1972; Acuna 2003) that permanently reconstructed social, physical, and economic relations. In the most destructive era of modern Los Angeles, this barrio was forced to absorb the dubious logic that one community could serve as the only location for five major freeway corridors. No other community was dissected by this number of distinct transportation routes. In an era when environmentalism was relegated to wilderness protection battles and stuck within a conservationist anti-urban logic (Hays 1987), minority spatial conflicts were not deemed important. East L.A., without either political access or recourse to environmental law, was powerless to halt the destruction. The first major system, the Santa Ana Freeway, cut diagonally through the southern sector of East L.A. Simultaneously, the Golden State (I-5) and San Bernardino (1–10) freeways were constructed. The former, which is a major north-south system, went through Lincoln Heights and linked with the Santa Ana in the southern part of the community. The latter, an east-west system, was routed through Boyle Heights and City Terrace. Mass opposition emerged against California’s powerful transportation agency (Acuna 1984, 40) in defense of barrio rights against freeways that would cause destruction. These systems emasculated contiguous neighborhoods, created new barrio demarcations, destroyed massive tracts of affordable housing, devastated the local economy, and forced the dislocation of thousands of families. Consequently, the community suffered from the loss of social cohesion and a severe increase in air pollution. However, this was not enough. After having absorbed the brunt of the Interstate system, East L.A. was targeted again in the late 1960s and 1970s. Two others went through the heart of the community. The first was the Pomona Freeway, an east-west route, and the second was the Long Beach Freeway (State Highway 710), a north-south system. These final systems nearly destroyed one of the most historic early suburbs of Los Angeles. By the mid-1970s East

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L.A. was transformed into a series of massive physical barricades. New barrios resulted and were often in conflict with neighborhoods which had originally been contiguous. Businesses either failed or relocated. The stark landscape was characterized for over a generation by desolate, abandoned corridors. Prior to the debate over environmental quality, no community suffered harsher impacts from air pollution than residents in East L.A. This impact continues into the current period. Five separate systems of congested, slow-moving traffic has spewed millions of tons of both heavy and light particulates into this community. To make matters worse, a significant level of manufacturing occurs within East L.A. and across the Los Angeles River. This unprecedented destruction of cohesive, socially integrated communities led directly to economic destablization. Economically depressed zones and splintered neighborhoods fractured social relations. Increased gang formation and activity was one direct result. Without environmental laws, not only was the community powerless to stop the destruction. Moreover, there was no replacement housing, which resulted in overcrowding and structural deterioration. Homeowners and renters were forced to compete in a constricted housing market in an era characterized by residential apartheid (Massey and Denton 1993). The history of freeway destruction is not unique to East Los Angeles. Barrios in Phoenix, San Antonio, San Diego, El Paso, and San Jose experienced extensive physical dislocation in relation to freeway route designations that specifically targeted barrio space. In some instances, entire barrios were demolished. In most cities, barrios experienced a planning rationality that viewed them as expendable. State transportation agencies conspired with local elites to center the brunt of freeway construction on minority zones. They often failed to reimburse Latina/o property owners at fair market value, totally ignored the impact on affordable housing, provided minimal relocation benefits to renters (if any), and brazenly ignored protests against proposed routes through barrios (Acuna 1984).

The Impact of Environmental Laws and Environmental Justice Environmental justice is not solely centered on Chicana/o and/or minority urban social movements. This concept does not correspond to a specific cultural identity. The environment is universal, as are significant, negative public health impacts on global culture. Industrial capitalism essentially mandates a serious pollution crisis, but generally assumes that it is a small price to pay for economic development (Pena 1997; O’Connor 1994). Environmental legislation is among the most important social policies of the late twentieth century. As exemplified in the previous section, public officials and the private sector were not required to provide information pertaining to environmental issues for public review. Discourse on public health impacts was not deemed important. The 1960s generation proved essential in transforming state policy to incorporate a series of laws forcing economic interests, the urban policy cartel, and planners to address negative environmental impacts. This controversial shift in public policy has influenced political

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discourse. However, one particular trend—the shift from the public policy arena into the court system—has changed the nature of environmental struggles (Hays 1987). The impact of environmentalism in the United States is related to major state and federal legislation. The passage of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in 1969, and the subsequent establishment of the Council on Environmental Quality and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), was transformative (Hays 1987; Moss 1977). Congress linked funding for projects directly with the demand to conduct “environmental review” to determine the long-term negative consequences of projects. Unfortunately, initially environmental analysis tended “to reinforce a mode of thinking in which developmental considerations were dominant and environmental ones subordinate” (Hays 1987, 281). The benefits for the public, however, are significant when viewed in light of the history of environmentalism in industrialized societies. Prior to 1970, only elites had the capability to finance and/or politically lobby against land use proposals. One example was Caltrans’ proposal for a second east-west route through the middle of Los Angeles. This route was designed to travel through the elite neighborhoods of Hancock Park, Beverly Hills, and Westwood. Guess which freeway was never built prior to the passage of environmental laws? Middle- and working-class communities had only one recourse— public protest. Environmental legislation transformed the power of the public in relation to land use controversies. In California, the state legislature adopted one of the most comprehensive environmental laws in the nation in 1970 (Remy et al. 1992). The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) significantly expanded the criteria required to meet the threshold of comprehensive environmental analysis. CEQA increased the categories for analysis, established important public hearing mandates, and vested significant powers in local government to enforce environmental procedures. The environmental impact report (EIR) standards were more stringent than that of the federal environmental impact statement (EIS) (Remy et al. 1992, 9). Thus, EIRs in California forced project proponents to incorporate a qualitatively different level of analysis in conjunction with any project that included federal funding. Initially, public interest groups, government, and the private sector were perplexed on how to proceed with these new powers. The quality of environmental documentation and reports varied widely between jurisdictions and regions (Moss 1977). The type of public hearings and length of review varied greatly. The planning profession was totally unprepared for this changing technical and political environment. Engaged members of civic society, however, almost immediately comprehended the significance of the changes. Finally, local social actors had a chance to mitigate or stop projects within a pluralist arena. They now used environmentalism to expose the contradictions of local development policies (Gould et al. 1996). Environmental organizations instrumental in the passage of federal and state legislation gained advantage in debates on development proposals. A new field, environmental law, now intersected with the more established land use law field. For a few years, the debate consisted of both technical and citizen input in relation to assessing the positive and negative benefits and/or impacts of specific proposals. However, by the late 1970s, lawyers—for both environmental groups and the private sector—began to dominate the process (Turner 1988). Instead of a reliance on public hearings, city

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officials, and specifically planners, shifted to a position that essentially forced opponents into the court system to oppose projects. The increasing role of legal action diminished the role of citizens, since legal fees limited the scope of public participation (Turner 1988). While environmental policy remained an invaluable resource, field remains complex and difficult to master. Confronted with extensive analysis, volumes of technical data, and wide variance in the interpretation of what constituted comprehensiveness, environmental review proved daunting. Urban social movements and growth control advocates began relying on environmental organizations to assist them on their local issues. Their opponents—the development interests and the pro-growth hegemony that characterizes the Southwest, developed “a war chest…to help in propaganda and legal assaults against any community trying to…stop growth” (Finkler 1974, 166). Minority community activists were generally conversant with environmental laws and citizen review. However, they did not utilize environmental strategies in the initial stages of their oppositional movements. Opposition to proposals that would destabilize spatial relations in barrios focused mainly on the planning profession’s abuse of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) programs. When this failed—as it often did—they adopted different protest strategies. Hence, environmentalism became central to the defense of community. The environmental review process developed a new constituency that recognized the limits of political intervention. The arena of political pluralism had proven to be ineffective (Parenti 1970, 1980; Kariel 1961; Gaventa 1980; Dumhoff 1967). Disillusioned, these social actors began to rely on environmentalism as an avenue to challenge conventional power relations. It is within this dualism, the political marginalization of barrio residents and the rise of environmentalist logic, that the environmental justice movement emerged.

Chicana/o Environmental Justice Movements of the 1990s Chicana/o social movements in the 1990s replicated the dynamics of previous decades. Community leaders, with limited political leverage, were determined to halt regressive land use proposals and/or force governments to address environmental issues. But the majority of social movements remained in a reactive position in relation to discriminatory planning policy. These extended conflicts, as in the past, were centered on the defense of barrio spatial relations, and opposition to negative planning proposals. In the Southwest, social movements aggressively engaged urban cartels and government agencies over a range of planning and land use issues. A host of simmering environmental crises also coalesced into one potent symbol, the rapidly industrializing border zone. The passage of NAFTA, which expanded maquiladora development, worsened a major environmental crisis (Pena 1997; Grossman and Krueger 1991). Mexican governmental policy had utterly failed to address severe and long-term environmental degradation in a period of unprecedented industrialization and urbanization along the border. The acute lack of basic urban infrastructure for both residential areas and industrial zones has been the cause of debilitating environmental problems along the shared border region (Herzog 1990, 1986). The inability of NAFTA’s

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environmental side agreements to tangibly address this issue has led to serious public health problems. What has emerged is an integral connection between environmental logic and Chicana/o social movements in the late twentieth century. Relying on a tradition of sociopolitical struggles, they utilized environmental laws and policies to defend barrio space and public health. The influence of this movement has forced the planning profession into a new terrain of inclusionary planning politics that exists within a milieu of social protest, administrative review, and the court system. The Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice (SNEEJ) This organization evolved from early social justice luchas throughout the Southwest and became involved in a range of land use, redevelopment, economic justice, and environmental controversies. In April 1990, the Southwest Organizing Project (SWOP) in Albuquerque, New Mexico hosted a major meeting of leading environmental activists to develop a cohesive network of mutual support and to share knowledge of environmental justice struggles that had occurred since the early 1980s (Marquez 2003; Moore and Head 1994). This event created momentum to establish a formal organizational structure to assist all groups in the region in their efforts to lobby local, state, and federal agencies. Also, the aim was to ultimately consolidate the activism of numerous groups within one entity (Marquez 2003; Moore and Head 1994). The result was the development of a platform that linked environmentalism, economic justice, cultural preservation, and antiracism (Marquez 1998; Pena 1992). The organizations represented a multi-ethnic coalition of activist groups that had opposed regressive industrial and environmental policy and which was centered around community mobilization and empowerment (Marquez 2003). They confronted powerful state and regional agencies as well as economic interests whose policies had a long-term negative impact on barrio spatial relations. SWOP was among the entities with a decadelong history of progressive environmental and economic justice activism (Moore and Head 1994). The organization opposed industries that historically polluted urban barrios in Albuquerque and other cities in the state. They also established a proactive economic justice platform advocating liveable wages, environmentally sophisticated workplace conditions, local community control over economic development policy, and an antiracist strategy in relation to coalition building (Moore and Head 1994). A range of activists from other states had simultaneously engaged in difficult land use and environmental struggles during the 1980s. These groups encountered political resistance from powerful urban cartels, planning agencies that deflected or denied fundamental critiques of planning practice, and manufacturers and business alliances that manipulated the political arena to resist addressing negative impacts on barrios from toxic and industrial pollution (Marquez 1998, 2003). They had to rapidly work to increase knowledge about city planning, environmental regulations, federal and state laws, the administrative critique process, and the judicial system in their communities. This broad regional coalition addressed two other critical issues: racism within mainstream environmental organizations (Marquez 2003; Pena 1998), and the need for a sustainable economic policy at the local and regional level (Marquez 2003). Marquez, in assessing the dilemma of challenging economic elites to address fundamental social

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change from a vantage point of limited political power, wrote that “The SNEEJ organizations…were humbled as their best efforts to hold local industry accountable to the minority community were ignored…. Two years after they initiated the campaign for corporate responsibility… (they) were still struggling to be heard” (Marquez 2003, 35). What is important about this history is the continued strategizing within barrio-based social movements to move beyond reactive political mobilization into proactive demands for community control over economic policy. Within their corporate responsibility platform, SNEEJ and the coalition have expanded the parameters of environmentalism to incorporate the living wage, sustainable green economic development, and defense of the social, political, and environmental integrity of barrios. The defense of barrio spatial relations and the resurgence of traditions of resistance are in the vanguard of the new environmentalism in the Southwest (Rosenbaum 1981). SNEEJ has inherited a legacy of oppositional social mobilization based upon internal solidarity within minority communities. The traditions of mutualista-based collectivism, an appreciation of the land and its defense, the power of social mobilization, and the challenge to industrialism (Pena 1997) are recentering environmental discourse. SNEEJ is forcing public policy to respond to a new vision of the future, an inclusionary society based on sustainable economic principles (Marquez 2003) that mandate fundamental restructuring of social and economic relations. The trajectory of this movement is intertwined with multiculturalism’s recent success in restructuring social relations in the region. The Mothers of East Los Angeles One of the social movements that exemplify Chicana/o social activism in land use controversies is based in East L.A. The planning controversy was centered on a proposal to locate a major state prison in Los Angeles County (Pardo 1998; Russell 1989). Although a majority of the state inmate population is from Los Angeles, prisons are located in other areas of the state. In the mid-1980s, the Department of Corrections initiated plans to develop a prison site in Los Angeles. This effort paralleled an era of unprecedented prison construction in which the budget for prisons was the largest line item in the state budget. State analysts determined that a location near downtown Los Angeles, in the industrial sector, was an optimal site. The state negotiated with the Democratic mayor, state representatives, and county officials for land use permits and approval. The project would be the first state (as opposed to local) prison located in the county. The specific location was close to residential areas in the East L.A. barrio. In the late 1970s the state legislature approved the project. Once land purchases were finalized, state corrections officials formally approved bids for construction. Community residents became aware of the project in the mid-1980s. In typical fashion, a significant number of administrative and political actions had already occurred. In particular, political consensus had developed between a Republican governor and Democratic state representatives to construct the project. Local activists were caught in an untenable situation. The project was approved, the land purchased and rezoned, and with a bipartisan political consensus. How could marginalized activists who were politically weak within their own community oppose, much less halt, California’s powerful Department of Corrections?

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Informal meetings led by an older generation of Mexicanas and Chicanas in East L.A. formalized opposition to the prison and created a new organization, Las Madres de Este Los Angeles (MELA) (Pardo 1998; Russell 1989). Marginalized by gender, class, and ethnicity, these mujeres were determined to stop a project that they deemed damaging to the social cohesion in their neighborhood. One of their major concerns was the fact that the site was within a mile of numerous schools—three elementary schools, two high schools (private and public), and a middle school. The prison would release felons a short distance from residential zones. Their fear was that, upon release, violent criminals would place the entire community at constant risk. Tactically their major problem was: Where to begin? What strategies could halt a project that was already steamrolling toward completion? Who would listen to a group of vejitas opposing a powerful state agency and politicians? Could they develop additional support in East L.A.? Looming over all these daunting challenges was the fact that no one in the group was conversant with land use or environmental policy. Determined to resist, MELA organized a series of demonstrations, attended hearings to protest the project and lobbied local officials to change their position (Pardo 1998; Russell 1989). These efforts proved futile. However, esta mujeres were persistent. They started to seek other technical resources to assist their struggle. A few neighborhood groups, including the Neighborhood Action Committee fighting the Long Beach freeway extension, joined their struggle. But the movement during the next two years had virtually no impact, nor did the public seem interested in the issue. In one of the most eclectic public relations maneuvers ever adopted by a modest social movement, MELA developed a protest strategy based on the experiences of Las Madres de la Plaza in Argentina. They started to conduct weekly candlelight marches from their homes to the proposed site. While participation varied, one factor influenced both the movement and public recognition of the struggle. Since they were generally conducted in the middle of the week, on slow news nights (translation: no major car chase or scandal) local news broadcasts found the imagery of parents, youth, and children in strollers marching through East L.A. in the early evening compelling enough visuals to supplement the evening news. The coverage, given their social location—mujeres from East L.A.—was unprecedented. By 1987, the entire city knew that a growing movement against the prison was building in the Eastside. High-priced political consultants could not have developed a better strategy to publicize a political movement. MELA obtained the assistance of the Natural Resources Defense Council to assist in the development of an environmental challenge to the proposal. This strategy was effective in delaying state funding to complete construction. In addition, two Chicana elected officials, then state assembly members, Gloria Molina and Lucille Roybal-Allard, aligned themselves with MELA. Thus, gender splintered the Eastside political establishment. The support of Molina and Roybal-Allard was crucial in legitimating MELA as a political force. By the late 1980s relations between the Democratic-controlled state legislature and a conservative Republican governor soured. The prison was one of the governor’s pet projects. The Democratic leadership used the project to punish the governor in negotiations over budget and policy debates. Eliminating the line item for this project was a major point of contention, an issue the governor could not surmount. The governor finally agreed on a compromise. The state would build a new prison in either a suburban

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or rural Euro-American sector of the county and include jail cells in a previously approved state court house. In return, Democrats would support funding for the inner-city prison. The state completed the first two stages, but then the Democrats reneged on the compromise. The issue reached a standoff between 1989 and 1991. The environmental challenges had delayed the project enough to complicate funding. MELA, with mounting popular support, forced a change in the position of local (male) state legislators. In 1992, the governor had resigned himself to the fact that the prison would not be built. Essentially, MELA had worn the governor’s office down, creating a sense of defeatism. Finally, the governor formally announced that his office would no longer pursue funding for the prison. Las mujeres had proved the political establishment, Democratic and Republican, wrong. These marginalized vejitas had exhibited a courage and sophistication in challenging the state of California and a powerful governor in defense of community and won. This remains the most significant political victory on the Eastside since the student blowouts in 1968. Wilmington, Toxic Pollution, and the Air Quality Management District The communities of Wilmington, San Pedro, and Carson are predominantly Chicana/o communities that also include eastern Euro-American ethnic groups. These communities are located directly adjacent to the major oil and petrochemical manufacturing zone for Southern California. The Los Angeles and Long Beach Harbors are also in close proximity. The surrounding area is among the most polluted industrial zones in the nation. Oil and petrochemical manufacturing have frequent “minor” gas and toxic releases, sporadic system ruptures, and occasional major fires. The volatile gases and mixture of a range of chemicals are constantly destabilizing. The most common incidents are brief episodes in which valves or pipes leak. Gas and toxic plumes release into the air and dissipate in a relatively brief period. System ruptures include small explosions, piping malfunctions, chemical mixtures that create powerful reactions, and erosion of critical valves and linkage sections. These ruptures create minor and moderate releases that can last from a few hours to half a day. Sections of the system end up being shut down to control the release of materials and combustion, and to repair the system. Major breaches of the system require extensive emergency services intervention. These three communities, of which Carson is an independent city, are recipients of this flow of foul air and toxic air pollution, and have to deal with both intermittent emergencies and the specter of potential major disasters. Numerous residential zones are within a quarter-mile of these facilities. Many elementary, middle, and high school campuses are also in very close proximity to the petrochemical industry. During serious emergencies, when parts of the plant would blow up and become engulfed by a major fire, area residents would sit outside and watch the event. These massive releases of heavy toxic pollutants are worsened by the combination of chemicals during intense fires. This pollution, mainly heavier particulates, tends to travel only short distances. Thus, area residents were at direct risk from high levels of toxic air contamination and should have been ordered to remain indoors until the emergency had ended. The community was

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under constant attack from airborne pollution. Wilmington is closest to this industrial infrastructure and area residents suffer the most severe health impacts. Unfortunately, the South Coast Air Quality Management District (AQMD) and local officials tended to ignore a situation in which economic considerations obscured major public health issues. The level of toxic air pollution was never in question, nor was the fact that vulnerable populations, particularly children and the elderly, were negatively impacted. The most problematic were toxic episodes in which plumes of chemical pollutants would flow over schools when children were engaged in physical activities during and after school. In a vast majority of incidents, companies were not compelled to call school officials and inform them about the crisis. Thus, young children and teens would breathe highly polluted air, damaging their respiratory systems on an annual basis. Twenty years after passage of the hstoric Clean Air Act, Southern California air quality authorities had not addressed this problem. In the early 1990s, an organization that evolved from the dismantling of a major General Motors automobile plant in the San Fernando Valley, the Labor Community Strategy Center (LCSC), started to focus on air quality issues in the region. At this time, public interest was intense due to industry-supported proposals to create an air pollution market—essentially a privatized air quality marketplace for Los Angeles. LCSC joined in this conflict to lobby against an industry-dominated AQMD board that tended to delay the implementation of air pollution control mandates. The agency was under a barrage of lawsuits trying to force the AQMD to comply with state and federal regulations. Shifting from the main focus, LCSC initiated an organizing drive in Wilmington. The goal was to disseminate public information related to air quality regulations and inform residents about the constant violation of basic air quality standards by the petrochemical and oil manufacturing industries. Initial efforts in 1990–1991 were met with skepticism by area residents. They were not familiar with LCSC organizers, did not believe that the powerful industries could be reformed, nor had they had any prior relations with AQMD. The Chicana/o community had no frame of reference in relation to addressing the crisis in public health issues. A few residents gradually began to support the effort and assisted in community organizing. By this time, there was a new label for the intense toxic pollution from this type of industrial production: “hot spots.” LCSC members and Wilmington residents developed a strategy to force the AQMD to acknowledge the serious air pollution crisis. They demanded that petrochemical and oil manufacturing corporations produce emergency plans. In addition, LCSC demanded that information on the number and type of toxic releases be reported on an annual basis. When the AQMD resisted, it only infuriated area residents and increased local mobilization. In 1992 AQMD conducted its first major hearing on air pollution issues in the harbor area. Staff scientists presented information that validated the obvious: this was a zone of intense toxic air pollution and that numerous intermittent episodes of air pollution releases were a common occurrence. LCSC subsequently accused the agency of failing to enforce its own regulations to protect the public’s health. They also demanded that the agency conduct public hearings in Wilmington, for the first time in its history, including provision of Spanish translators and bilingual printed materials for these meetings. The new knowledge about the crisis and a complete lack of enforcement activity led to community demands that the AQMD implement emergency measures that would force

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industry to inform the community and school officials whenever a toxic incident occurred. They also lobbied for a comprehensive plan to limit the health risk to area residents in the future. Industrial representatives, trapped by their own information and acknowledgment of toxic air pollution releases, resigned themselves toward complying with this effort. The AQMD adopted a major reform program that forced industry to address this crisis on three levels. The agency would conduct a comprehensive, bilingual bicultural public information campaign to inform the public about the hazardous toxic air pollution and establish safety measures that families should follow during emergencies. The second phase mandated that whenever a toxic air pollution release occurred, public school officials had to be informed within thirty minutes to ensure that outdoor physical activity could be halted and windows to classrooms closed. The final reform was a comprehensive community emergency response system. In the instance of a major explosion or fire, plant operators had to inform emergency officials immediately, join police in advising residents to either stay indoors, or evacuate entire neighborhoods due to the potential toxic disaster that could result. Companies were mandated to assign staff for public safety-related issues to inform school and emergency officials on any type of hazardous situation. This was a significant political victory for both the Wilmington community and LCSC. This was one of the first instances that a Chicana/o-based environmental justice movement forced a major public agency, one established to address air pollution, to defend the public health of barrio residents. The tragedy was that this “progress” occurred a quarter century after passage of the Clean Air Act. In the interim the health of young children was sacrificed for economic gain. Trash Burning, Birth Defects, and NAFTA in the South Rio Grande Valle In the late 1980s, a seemingly mysterious medical crisis impacted the South Valle region in the MacAllen, Laredo, and Brownsville area of Texas. Numerous women were experiencing extremely problematic pregnancies or tragic birth defects. The problem, during the first stages, was not assumed to be environmentally related. However, as the level of medical problems increased, they caused a sense of alarm within barrio social networks, and questions arose. Why were a high number of Tejanas experiencing problems related to pregnancies? There were “too many women,” and indirectly families, who had to confront difficult personal decisions related to the severe birth defects and/or premature deliveries of deformed infants. When the silence was broken, led by Tejanas in the South Valle, one of the most tragic crises of industrial capitalism—pollution-related birth defects (Morris 1992)—would eventually implicate NAFTA policy failures, including illegal cross-border disposal of toxic industrial waste products, poor landfill management practices along the border, the insensitivity of regional public health officials, the acute lack of monitoring of the border by U.S. authorities, and the complete abandonment of clean water laws in the United States. The South Valle, the most historic point of entry into the Southwest, has a mythical cultural logic that has influenced Chicana/o culture and urbanism since the 1700s. Throughout the modern era of Southwest expansion, migration from the Valle has impacted every sector in this region. The frontera created a unique arena of cultural

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relations between First Nations and European immigrants. Mexico established the first urban settlements in this region, and the demand for labor north of the Rio Bravo established Tejana/o culture (Arreola 2002). The emergence of this regional identity coincides with the urban histories of San Antonio and El Paso, the major Tejana/o cities, and remains intrinsically centered in the barrios and colonias along the frontera. That cultural heritage would prove crucial in the struggle to determine why the South Valle was experiencing a public health crisis of unprecedented magnitude. The MacAllen, Laredo, and Brownsville areas had historically possessed a colonia labor system (Barrera 1988) in which a dual wage structure, a stratified labor force, and overt repression created an apartheid system separating Tejanas/os from Euro-Americans. By the late 1800s, barrios had declined into zones with severely deteriorating, overcrowded housing, virtually no urban infrastructure, and irregular public services. In the twentieth century, these areas were centers of labor strikes and oppositional movements based in mutualista societies and the political influences of the Mexican revolution. However, deteriorating urban conditions persisted though the 1960s. Agriculture, tourism, oil, ranching, cross-border commerce, and manufacturing characterized the regional economy. Immigration, correlated to a historic demand for low-wage labor, has permanently influenced the cultural milieu of the frontera (Herzog 1990). Most border cities have relatively smaller urban formations north of the Rio Bravo and substantially larger urban zones on the south. The public health crisis in the South Valle was directly related to the rampant, illegal disposal of hazardous wastes from U.S. manufacturers who failed to adhere to federal clean water mandates. A residual administrative and regulatory failure was an acute lack of enforcement of clean water regulations. The economy of illegal disposal is relatively simple. Manufacturers practice deceptive administrative audits of liquids, solvents, chemicals, toxic materials, and waste water that are required by federal mandates (Cahn 1995). Thus, they avoid the costs related to tracking these toxic and industrial wastes to licensed facilities for environmentally regulated disposal. They “retain the services” of illicit tank truckers, who for a fee below market cost transport this industrial waste across the border to Mexican-operated landfills. This practice has been a integral component of border economic relations during the last quarter century. This practice has created numerous environmental problems along the border, including intensifying water pollution; reconcentration of chemical, toxic, and industrial pollution in urban zones; and damage to regional aquifers. A common practice of burning waste in Mexican landfills to reduce the amount of trash inherently translates into a mix of household and industrial trash. This results in the creation of new hazardous and toxic substances formed from burning a multitude of different toxic industrial pollutants. What was not anticipated in the transhipment of U.S. industrial toxic pollution was that the frontera’s ecology did not adhere to political demarcations. The crisis developing in the South Valle resulted from the dumping of industrial pollutants in Mexico that were then burned. Regional wind patterns then sent the pollution north into South Texas. The public health impacts—in particular severely deformed new born children (Pinkerton 1993; Nusser and Haurwitz 1995)—were immediate. One of the worst results of problem pregnancies was brain deformation (Nusser and Haurwitz 1995). In addition, numerous cancer-related illnesses impacted families in Tejana/o barrios. County and state health officials did not respond—the statistically high level of problem pregnancies and

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cancer illnesses among barrio households was not considered a major public health problem. Rather, it was a “mystery,” possibly associated with cultural idiosyncrasies. The lack of attention from regional and local health officials was noted by Tejana activists knowledgable of the looming public health crisis. In 1990 and 1991, community leaders demanded answers from local health officials. Ignored by these officials, Tejanas organized a social movement to determine the cause of the health crisis. They demanded information on the source of the problem. What were the causes that were creating an inordinate level of birth defects (Pinkerton 1993)? When public health officials finally started to respond, they found high levels of toxic pollutants in fetuses and newborn infants. This fact initially puzzled Tejana activists, since most did not reside directly adjacent to intensive manufacturing or toxic landfills. This basic public health investigation led to a determination that illegal toxic and hazardous waste dumping practices by U.S. manufacturers were the foundational cause of the crisis. The waste burning practices in Mexico landfills, where all wastes were first dumped into a “toxic cesspool” and then mixed with other substances, was a recipe for disaster. Burning the entire site created a toxic cloud, and regional wind patterns redirected it in a reverse migration, back north of the Rio Bravo. Once they had this information, Tejana leaders demanded that Texas state and federal officials aggressively enforce Clean Water Act policies. They protested to force state authorities to assume “control of the border,” in this instance the U.S. side, to monitor waste haulers illegally transporting toxic and hazardous substances (Dawson 1992). They further demanded that both governments terminate illegal dumping practices. They demonstrated against Mexican officials to stop burning municipal trash with hazardous, toxic wastes, and structurally change landfill practices along the border. Tejanas led a movement that incorporated action against two national governments, two state agencies, regional public health agencies, and manufacturers in states within a 500-mile radius of the border. They eventually sued over eighty corporations that were identified as engaging in illegal disposal of industrial hazardous wastes (Pinkerton 1993). This women-led social movement won the political struggle and forced the implementation of a series of reforms to insure comprehensive adherence to Clean Water Act regulations. Unfortunately, because it was ignored for so long, a significant number of women and families suffered the consequences of a high level of birth defects and cancers in the South Valle region. Sierra Blanca: Binational Opposition to a Radioactive Waste Landfill Proposal in the El Paso Region The crisis related to the disposal and management of low-level radioactive and toxic industrial waste is an issue that has developed into a common land use controversy in barrios throughout the Southwest. The previous case study is only one of numerous instances in which this societal dilemma intersects directly with Chicana/o urbanism in the Southwest. In the toxic landfills in Macfarland and Casmalia in Central California; in industrial zones in Albuquerque, El Paso, Los Angeles, and Ward Valley (which straddles the Arizona and California border); and in maquiladora zones along the frontera, hazardous waste disposal proposals have unerringly identified barrio locations as “prime.” What this implies is that the most vulnerable and marginalized communities

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are politically convenient areas for dumping. Planning through the modern era persists in practicing “toxic imperialism.” “Any negative health impacts…will then be visited on those least able to deal with them. Since most of the poor and the disempowered are people of color, the impact is racially discriminatory…. The question of stigmatization of ‘the other’ through, in this instance, association of racially marked others with pollution, defilement, impurity, and degradation becomes part of the political equation” (Harvey 1996, 368). In Sierra Blanca, a small rural area in west Texas, a radioactive repository was proposed and endorsed by state officials in 1992. This generated an intense political opposition and a cross-border social movement to prevent the proposed waste site from being constructed (Vasquez-Castillo 2001). Colonias and activists “initiated a long process of transborder and transnational community mobilization” (Vasquez-Castillo 2001) to halt the Sierra Blanca radioactive waste repository. The site was in close proximity to the watershed and system of aquifers servicing the El Paso and Juarez metropolitan area, with a population of approximately 1.7 million. The proposal would have long-term negative impacts on the surrounding area, increase residential and industrial uses in the vicinity, and potentially influence maquiladora expansion. Basically, the proposal would accelerate the industrial waste disposal crisis in the border region. A key issue with the proposed location was the ecology of the region. The site is characterized as a desert, with sandy soil and limestone. The main problem is porous subsoil that allows leeching into groundwater systems that are directly adjacent to the Rio Bravo/Rio Grande watershed. In a similar context to the Ward Valley proposal in California, the high potential of erosion of the repository system would eventually lead to contamination of the entire watershed with cancerous radioactive and toxic pollutants. The proposal lacked technical assurances that the facility would effectively control hazardous and toxic wastes on a long-term basis. It was also a precedent for treating border communities as a dumping ground for industrial wastes. Texas officials are required to develop low-scale radioactive repositories to address the increasing industrial waste by-products related to manufacturing, medical uses, and research (Hays 1987; Cahn 1995). The current practice is to use an on-site storage system of limited capacity within metropolitan areas. The main problem with this is the projected erosion of metal containers, which will lead to radioactive releases in urban areas. The “Texas solution” was to identify a distant small rural border site with low population density. This was a bald attempt to force a rural community viewed as politically weak to absorb radioactive wastes generated in metropolitan areas. Thus, Sierra Blanca, a “nonpopulated” border area of Mexicanas/os and Tejanas/os, was selected as the optimal location (Vasquez-Castillo 2001). People on both sides of the border acted against the proposed project. Area residents, environmentalists, and barrio leaders rapidly mounted a vigorous critique of the proposal. They engaged in hunger strikes, pickets, and demonstrations, extending their lucha far beyond west Texas. The Sierra Blanca Legal Defense Fund (SBLDF) was established to assist in developing a legal strategy to halt the project (Sierra Blanca). Mexicana/o activists across the border were fearful of public health impacts and effectively lobbied all political parties to sign a document opposing the project (Vasquez-Castillo 2001).

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Texas residents residing in border communities opposing the project exhibited a willingness to work with Mexican activists in a joint oppositional movement. They recruited environmental organizations to assist in analyzing land use and environmental reports. This was an important cross-border and multi-ethnic coalition in Texas. Community organizing achieved its major objective, generating regional public opposition to defend border communities from regressive land use proposals. Opponents critiqued policies of both governments, state and federal, while mandating a comprehensive, federal environmental review process. This forced Texas officials to acknowledge a range of public health risks: contamination of the Rio Bravo/Rio Grande watershed, problems related to unstable soil, and the volatility of radioactive industrial waste and toxic materials. SBLDF threatened a lawsuit to halt action on the project and submitted testimony at public hearings challenging the legitimacy of the project proposal (Sierra Blanca 1998). The organization also challenged the locational analysis and rationale for Sierra Blanca. In 1998 this transborder, community-based alliance prevailed. Due to mounting political protest and intervention by the Mexican government, Texas authorities abandoned the project (Vasquez-Castillo 2001). This was an important environmental and political victory that exhibited the political power of an effective cross-border environmental movement. It is also an example of the ability of Tejanas/os to articulate an opposition to regressive land use proposals in defense of a regional watershed. Sierra Blanca is another case study of environmentally unjustified proposals targeting lower income communities. It is a repetition of how the planning creates linkages between rural areas and urban centers, where most of the waste is generated, in repeated attempts to revisit racist planning principles and practice in the Southwest.

New Chicana/o Social Movements Chicana/o environmental social movements are a continuation of historic demands for political inclusion and equal access to political institutions. Communities determined to challenge discrimination are pressuring planning and urban cartels over the built environment (Pena 1998; Bullard 1994; Pulido 1996). This signals the termination of an era in which barrio environmental concerns were secondary to economic policy and the demands of real estate interests. This movement possesses a series of new challenges to the practice of planning: the quality of life in marginalized communities and the character of the environmental movement itself, which had long prioritized the wilderness over urban environmental crises. Concurrently, it confronted an older generation of community leaders who are not convinced that environmental issues are paramount. This movement also presents a structured critique of federal environmental policy, which has historically focused on wilderness conflicts (Cahn 1995). The attention to urban issues is central to end a history of racist land use practices that diminish if not degrade minority spatial relations. The reality is a history in which “…political leaders have given less consideration to the linkage between environmental values and improvements in equity within wealthy economies. They are so significant that…environmental values are not likely to be politically successful unless and until major environment-equity tensions are at least partially resolved” (Paehlke 1997, 89).

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The environmental justice agenda confronts the entire arena of urban policy throughout the Southwest. A continual theme is confrontations with public officials and planners who want to locate noncompatible projects within barrios. Proposals for trash collection centers, industrial zones, manufacturing that uses hazardous chemicals, prisons, demolition of housing, and location of major transportation corridors are regressive. When it comes to barrios, planners have tended to abandon the conventional zoning practice of strict separation of uses. Planning officials are knowledgable about these negative impacts. Yet they limit access to information and manipulate public comment to blunt barrio opposition. In response, the emergence of a new political leadership has served as a catalyst for barrios to develop oppositional strategies to oppose environmentally regressive proposals. Activists have surmounted disadvantages in technical, political, and financial resources. In fact, most movements at the outset appeared to be symbolic protests that lacked the power to challenge entrenched special interests. Relying mainly on organizing and neighborhood empowerment, these movements have fearlessly confronted power in all of its manifestations in relation to urban planning and policy. What was the alternative? Constant environmental deterioration is untenable if barrios are to remain vibrant social and cultural spaces. Chicanas assuming leadership positions have also characterized this era (Pardo 1998; Fernandez-Kelly et al. 1997). Community organizing and developing confidence to oppose powerful special interests is dependent on cultural identity and communal solidarity (Touraine 1988; Gramsci 1971; Ruiz 1987). Mujeres are critical linkages within barrio culture. In fact, knowing that Latinas were in leadership positions quite possibly provided Euro-American elites the perception that the opposition was inherently weak. Political empowerment and the politics of gender are critical components of this movement. Community leaders also critiqued how environmental policy was, and is, applied unequally between middle- and upper-class Euro-American neighborhoods versus barrios. Social movements have used a range of methods to oppose regressive projects. They have forced planning to acknowledge that environmental logic is as essential within barrio space as other urban areas. Environmental justice is one form of political self-determination. It is a social movement that has yet to reach its full potential in the Southwest. Chicanas/os are defining the contours of environmentally coherent urban policy. They are fundamentally challenging discriminatory planning practices that foster the perception that incompatible land use proposals are appropriate for marginalized communities (Bullard 1994; Pena 1998). These movements have established a de facto Chicana/o environmental agenda. The focus on local controversies and the contradictions of public policy have generated an interest in a range of public policy issues. Air pollution, water conservation, open space preservation, monitoring of future land use relationships, and transportation are part of a holistic approach to enhancing spatial relations in barrios. Land use reforms and challenging planning to address past racist practices are inherent in these struggles. These

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social movements have also transformed the location and meaning of the phrase “quality of life.” They have reinvigorated democracy and the socio-political position of marginalized sectors (Touraine 1988; Mouffe 1992). In addressing these issues, urban minority environmentalists have become essential to the future of progressive planning and a sustainable environment.

11 The Political and Social Transformation of California The role, symbolic and substantive, of the Chicana/o populace in California has had a major influence on the politics and culture of the Southwest. The evolution of the historic East Los Angeles (East L.A.) barrio, the largest concentration of Chicanas/os and Mexicanas/os outside of Mexico City, was and is an essential reality of a culture of difference in an urban context that magnifies virtually all facets of the urban crisis. Other cities in the Southwest, all of which also have substantial and expanding Chicano/Mexicano barrios, pale in comparison to the sheer magnitude of the geography of East L.A. While the initial era of activist politics and early urban patterns emerged in South Texas prior to 1900, in particular San Antonio and El Paso, by the 1930s East L.A. had become not only an important component of Los Angeles but of urbanization patterns of barrios in the United States. In the Southwest, Chicana/o urbanism in California, especially in the southern sector of the state, has had a pronounced impact on the culture, economics, urbanization, and ethnic relations in this society. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Californio culture dominated the state. A system of social and economic relations centered on elite families exercised total control over indigenous and immigrant labor (Almaguer 1994). Social relations were sanctioned by the church and state, initially Spain then Mexico. The region’s urban form was situated mainly in the northern cities of Monterey, San Francisco, and Sacramento. A strict regime of labor control, initially linked directly to the rancho and mission systems, was formulated on the virtual enslavement of the entire indigenous population. Resistance to forced manual labor, a practice of servitude that dismantled a majority of the indigenous cultures existing prior to the conquest, was harshly punished. However, this system had an inherent flaw: the elite leadership was despised by laborers, both enslaved and immigrant, due to their position of absolute privilege (Bean 1968). This rural rancho system established relatively small settlement patterns in the southern and central coastal regions. Small towns in the dry, barren south experienced droughts that intermittently ruined the local economy. The Los Angeles region was an insignificant pueblo with an economy susceptible to extended periods of drought that devastated the regional agrarian and ranching interests. When Euro-American settlement patterns increased in the aftermath of the Gold Rush era, Californio society was rapidly overwhelmed (Almaguer 1994). EuroAmericans, in the aftermath of the war with Mexico—and enticed by gold—streamed into California in an unprecedented wave of migration (Bean 1968). In the 1880s, Los Angeles initiated its historic growth trajectory. Chicanas were a significant component in the workforce, a history that is finally emerging in labor literature. Latinas participated in canneries and packing, laundry, as domestics, and as store clerks by the late 1800s (Ruiz 1987). These lower-echelon

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positions, with significant wage differentials from both men and Euro-American women, indicated a high demand for Latina labor. This undervalued sector of regional labor markets was important in relation to urban systems through the provision of essential home care and maintenance services. This labor role within urbanized areas assumed by Latinas and other immigrant women contradicts the stereotyping of Latinas as totally domesticated within the framework of the nuclear family (Ruiz 1987). Latinas are and have always been an important component of the Southwest’s labor markets. In the current era, they remain both trapped in similar low-wage labor sectors (Acosta and Winegarten 2003; Lopez-Garza and Diaz 2001) and essential to the formulation of urban society in the Southwest. In the early 1900s, Los Angeles had a significant Chicana/o populace based in racially segregated residential zones adjacent to the civic center. This social sector was characterized by uneven development within a stratified regional economy from the inception of the expansion of urban Los Angeles (Acuna 1972). This set of social and economic relationships was portrayed as natural by local media, in particular the owners of the Los Angeles Times (Gottlieb and Wolt 1977). Growth in Southern California is a remarkable legacy given the wholly inadequate natural resources in the region to support a major metropolis. Expansion was dependent on a constant flow of immigration through the entire twentieth century. The political and cultural importance of the city’s barrio was established by the Magon brothers and the Partido Liberal Mexicano, when they relocated to “escape” political repression from both the Mexican and U.S. governments in Texas (Quinones 1973). The specter of a significant urban barrio held the promise, never realized, of insulating the partido from incessant harassment and political trials. Ricardo Magon, in particular, became an icon to oppositional forces during the early 1900s. Due to his political advocacy for working-class interests and the partidos’ courageous attempts to address racism in the Southwest, he was constantly harassed (Quinones 1973). He viewed Los Angeles as barrio with strong local support to publicize social justice demands in Mexico and the United States. The community did in fact support the partidos’ advocacy (Quinones 1973). However, they were powerless to keep Magon and the leadership out of prison and/or the court system. Magon died in federal prison, and after initial resistance by the United States, his remains were re-interred in Mexico City, where he is considered a national hero of the Mexican Revolution. The Magons proved that Chicanas/os in Los Angeles had the potential to challenge racism and discrimination. Politicization and oppositional consciousness remained the legacy of East L.A. through most of the last century. The growth of barrios in Los Angeles, while relatively small during this era, would continue to expand in the aftermath of the Mexican Revolution. This migration impacted the Southwest from 1910 into the 1930s. The barrio that enticed the Magon brothers for political purposes had the largest concentration of Mexican nationals in the United States by 1920. During the 1940s, Chicanas/os in Los Angeles had become the second most populous Latina/o urban community in North America (Camarillo 1993; Romo 1983). The expansive geography of East L.A., along with the establishment and growth of smaller barrios in the Los Angeles region, is central to Southwest Chicana/o urbanism. The urban transformation of Los Angeles demanded a low-wage labor force, initially centered in agriculture, manufacturing, domestic and household services, construction,

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and subsequently in services and retail. Within the regional economy, they were a critical component of a stratified labor system characterized by a rigid dual wage structure (McWilliams 1973; Barrera 1979). This racially imposed system of low wage injustice also meant a lower standard of living in relation to housing, consumption, and property ownership patterns. From the initial era of urban expansion, starting in the late 1880s, Chicanas/os were segregated into highly specified zones of the city. This pattern of racial segregation, which was only modestly opened during the ethnic transition of East L.A. between 1920 and 1950, characterized this region until the mid-1980s. A number of social movements, centered on labor struggles, emerged during the 1930s. These battles extended beyond confrontations over wages and workplace conditions into demands for political empowerment and against racism. While unsuccessful in relation to the latter, limited wage gains motivated further attempts to organize Chicana/o labor. One of the most significant early actions was centered in a small community east of Los Angeles, El Monte, which evolved into a series of regional labor actions that alarmed economic elites due to the militancy of workers in the early 1930s. Another influential action was that of Chicana cannery workers in Los Angeles, who eclectically relied on secondary boycotts and labor actions to win union recognition and workplace concessions (Ruiz 1987). The cannery workers struggle, resulting from the discriminatory history of the canning industry, impacted the political consciousness of the Eastside. This Latina-led victory was an important milestone, leading to a series of events that would begin to change political relations in Los Angeles and usher in the modern era of Chicana/o politics. The racially charged Sleepy Lagoon case, the Zoot Suit Riots, and the first major Chicano politician to contest for electoral office, Ed Roybal (Acuna 1972; Garcia 1994), followed in the aftermath of these labor struggles. However, Los Angeles was not the only center in relation to the formation of urban barrios in California. Chicana/o-dominated residential zones developed in all major cities—San Francisco, Sacramento, San Diego, Fresno, Long Beach, San Jose, Oakland, Riverside, and Santa Barbara. The geography of exclusion and difference was replicated in segregated barrios, normally within close proximity to civic centers and manufacturing zones. In all of these cities through the 1970s, barrios were clearly defined areas that had developed an internal history and geography correlated to the modern evolution of urbanization. Some of these barrios remain prominent—Logan Heights in San Diego, the Mission District in San Francisco, Del Paso Heights in Sacramento, Sal se Puedes in San Jose—while others merged during the late 1900s with other adjacent neighborhoods into significantly larger urban zones dominated by Chicanas/os. The main difference with East L.A. related to scale. Its seemingly exponential expansion made the Eastside unique. Most other barrios consisted of one distinct community within an expanding urban form. In percentage terms, the populace remained a minor factor in the social and political milieu in most other cities. Thus, the community was marginalized in relation to urban services, infrastructure, and education. Minority status reinforced limits on housing opportunities and business expansion beyond the barrio economy. The issue of police harassment was also intensified in relatively confined barrio spatial relations (Moore 1978; Vigil 1988). Leaving the barrio was an adventure, especially at night, since there was no recourse to police abuse and violence. Barrios in California were similar in relation to the built environment of other communities in the Southwest. Housing conditions were substandard, with a

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preponderance of units constructed in the late 1800s and early 1900s. In Los Angeles during the 1930s, Chicanas/os who worked on the rail lines “lived in shacks not tolerable for a stable” (Crump 1983, 143). In Santa Barbara’s Eastside barrio “Mexicanos had to contend with…inadequate housing, poor health care, and neglect by social agencies. The great majority…could not afford to own their own homes, nor could they afford to pay $10 to $15 per month for rent. As a result many were forced to live in overcrowded, unsanitary conditions” (Camarillo 1993, 158). Infrastructure and urban services were poorly maintained relative to other sections of the city. Overcrowded housing conditions, especially for a community with a higher per capita family size, meant that living arrangements dictated multiple uses of household space. The educational system was a mechanism to reinforce economic and social marginalization (Darder 1991; Foley 1990). Chicana/o youth were actively tracked into skilled trade classes and dissuaded from enrolling in advanced courses. Through the 1970s, numerous school districts engaged in practices that prevented Chicana/o students from applying for college (the author was told by his counselor that he would not be assisted nor allowed to apply to college in the late 1960s). A major precondition leading to uneven development is denial of educational opportunity. One service, public transportation, was available. The early growth of cities in California influenced the location of manufacturing, which in turn established a relatively compact urban form. The Red Car system in Los Angeles was considered the best regional transportation network in the nation (Crump 1983). These systems gradually transitioned to benefit minority transit demands. The initial rationale for urban transportation systems became obsolete in the post-World War II era, with the massive federal investment in highways. Thus, urban transportation became centered on users who generally resided in lower-income communities (Monkkonen 1988).

Evolution of the East Los Angeles Barrio During the early 1900s, East L.A. was among the first suburbs linking workers to the Los Angeles civic center. The area consisted mainly of eastern and southern European ethnic groups—Russian, Armenian, Molokans, Jews, and Italians (Romo 1983)—along with a modest percentage of Chicanas/os. This was the city’s first truly multi-ethnic neighborhood. Chicanas/os were one of numerous distinct minorities. In fact, there was resistance against minority migration east of the Los Angeles River into the Boyle Heights and City Terrace areas in the early 1900s. The civic center dominated economic, social, political, and administrative relations, and elite residential areas developed south and west of downtown. Working-class, ethnic neighborhoods were established north and east. A major physical barrier was the Los Angeles River, an unpredictable system that occasionally wreaked havoc on the central city during winter and spring floods. The Chicana/o community did not initially reside in East L.A. The community was centered in two areas: Sonora Town, located north of the historic Olvera Street (approximately ½ mile from the civic center), and in the eastern sector of the city (which is currently the industrial center). Another, sparsely settled hillside community, Chavez Ravine, was also a Chicana/o enclave. Since the initial era of urbanization, the 1870s and 1880s, the community existed on the fringe of the civic center in the oldest zones. The

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community east of the civic center coexisted with growing industrial development. Incompatible land use relationships were tolerated because they were located away from Euro-American neighborhoods. When civic elites determined that the city required a new, grandiose central train station, Sonora Town was one of two ethnic communities permanently transformed. Union Station was proposed in the middle of the Chinese community (Nelson 1983; Romo 1983). This was the city’s first major redevelopment action. The Chinese community was forcibly removed from its historic cultural location. This occurred in an era when remuneration to minorities from forced land sales was below market rates. Relocation benefits were nonexistent. In the aftermath, Sonora Town transitioned from a barrio into what is now Los Angeles’ Chinatown. Due to its proximity to the new train station, Asians moved into the nearest supply of affordable housing. Chicanas/os in Sonora Town were forced to relocate. This intracity migration further complicated the overcrowded housing conditions in the eastern sector of downtown. Other new significant urban infrastructure included a series of bridges linking Boyle Heights over the Los Angeles River. These bridges (on First, Fourth, and Sixth Streets, and Brooklyn Ave.) constituted important amenities for workers, who were landlocked during floods, which caused serious damage in Los Angeles through the 1930s. These ornate bridges that spanned the river formed a permanent link to the Eastside and opened the housing market to Chicanas/os for the next quarter century. The competition for space between residential and industrial uses in the east zone of the city forced a major migration east of the Los Angeles River (Romo 1983). Encountering resistance from Eastern Europeans in Boyle Heights, many Chicana/o households settled into two areas, Belvedere and Joyo Maravilla. In the 1910s and 1920s this community lacked basic infrastructure, and numerous residential areas did not have paved streets. But when the city’s expansionist policies opened new areas for residential development, the major streets and infrastructure in Boyle Heights were extended into these zones. Simultaneously, Chicanas/os began moving from the industrial zone into Boyle Heights in the 1920s and 1930s. During the first three decades of last century, the area was a multi-ethnic community in which Chicanas/os were the new minority. This transition was not without difficulty, and regressive social resistance was common. The ethnic experience of other Southwest cities was repeated: Euro-Americans resisted the incursion of Chicanas/os into white neighborhoods. By World War II, Chicanas/os had become the largest ethnic group in East L.A. Euro-American families began to migrate into the San Gabriel Valley and other developing suburbs. It was during this period that Boyle Heights, City Terrace, Maravilla, El Sereno, and Highland Park collectively transitioned into the largest Chicana/o urban community in the nation. Euro-American households maintained a significant presence through the 1960s. However, the business and cultural reconstruction of East L.A. mirrored the reality of an emerging major barrio. By the 1960s, the transition was complete. The Chicano/Mexicano composition of the eastside made this area the most expansive Latina/o urban zone in the country. East L.A. had become a Chicana/o city. It was during the 1940s that a series of events changed the political landscape of the Eastside and established the community as the center of Chicana/o political consciousness and culture in the region. The Sleepy Lagoon case, in which a number of

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Chicanos were arrested for the death of an individual in a fight, became the first major civil rights lucha in the modern era. The controversial blanket arrest of over a dozen Chicanos for one incident, and the questionable evidence linking all of the persons to the crime, was one of the most publicized incidents of the era (Acuna 1972; Garcia 1994). The community rallied behind the defendants, established a legal defense, and maintained support for their release. Another event focused on emerging urban Chicana/o culture, a dress style know as Zoot suits (Acuna 1972; Garcia 1994). The fashion, considered a form of social protest, rankled Euro-Americans, and a low intensity social conflict boiled through the late 1930s and early 1940s. In June, 1943, sailors on leave from duty attacked Zoot suiters in downtown Los Angeles. The local press approved sailors who “punished” Chicanas/os for violating de facto dress codes. Within a few days, sanctioned by the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), scores of sailors drove into East L.A. and actively sought out Zoot suiters and young Chicanas/os. A series of fights, street violence, and arrests of Chicano youth resulted. The press and Euro-American public strongly approved these vigilante actions. These two events led directly into a period of active political organizing and internal efforts to gain a semblance of political control. Two major political figures, Bert Corona (Garcia 1994) and Ed Roybal (Quinones 1990), emerged as leaders of a new political movement to empower the Eastside. Roybal entered the city council race in 1947. He lost, but the impact of this campaign and strong community support resulted in a second effort in 1949, which succeeded. Roybal became the first Chicano on the Los Angeles city council in almost eighty years. Corona focused his advocacy on both political empowerment and urban policy. One of his main issues was to desegregate public housing managed by the Housing Authority (Garcia 1994). Chicana/o applicants were routinely denied public housing, despite the fact that several projects were located in East L.A. Another major urban policy issue, the battle over Chavez Ravine, was supported by the entire Eastside leadership. Initially, Chavez Ravine was selected as a future site for a massive, modernist public housing development (Lopez 2002; Parson 1993). When the Brooklyn Dodgers decided to move west from New York, city officials ceded the neighborhood to the team’s owner, O’Malley, at a nominal price. The brutal, forced relocation of Chicana/o families was one of the most significant examples of blatant racism in relation to planning and public policy in the history of Los Angeles (Parson 1993). Councilman Roybal, in particular, experienced offensive and devious racist treatment in city council chambers due to his determined defense of Chavez Ravine. In spite of active resistance by families, especially vejitas, the LAPD eventually forced the most recalcitrant out of their homes (Lopez 2002; Parson 1993). A new media, television, documented police surrounding homes for weeks as residents steadfastly refused to move. This controversy, due to the intense media coverage, was a critical political moment in the modern era for Chicanas/os. Concurrently, another ominous urban transformation was being planned and implemented: the routing of five freeway systems through the Eastside (an issue previously addressed in this book). Meanwhile, East L.A. had become the symbolic and cultural center of Chicanas/os in California. It was the port of entry for immigrants from Mexico seeking refugee and entry into the labor force. During mid-century a significant percentage of this populace in the region had some connection to the Eastside, either family members or extended social

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networks. One factor reshaping urban patterns was the limitation of space on the Eastside. The housing stock was incapable of addressing the demands of this expanding ethnic populace. Structures built at the turn of the century were in poor condition, overcrowding was universal, and vacancy rates were extremely low. In spite of racist covenants governing home loans, and racism by a real estate industry that practiced open discrimination in suburban areas, Chicanas/os began seeking housing opportunities outside of East L.A. The first truly Chicana/o working-class suburb, Pico Rivera, experienced a significant immigration in the 1960s. Other communities surrounding the Eastside—Montebello, City of Commerce, Bell Gardens, and Monterey Park—also experienced a demographic transition during this period. The Eastside had become both a state of mind and a substantially larger urban geography. The barrio of the 1940s and 1950s had transcended into a significant geographic zone incorporating areas adjoining Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, and independent cities. In this newly defined Chicana/o city, now approximately 200 square miles, resided the largest concentration of contiguous Chicana/o urban neighborhoods ever. The greater Eastside, at the apex of the Civil Rights movement, was primed for a new generation of progressive politics demanding structural reform of social and political institutions. In the late 1960s and early 1970s a new period of political mobilization, protest, violence, and confrontation would again challenge repressive practices and lead to permanent reforms in education, politics, and social institutions (Acuna 1988; Quinones 1990). The Chicano Power era, fueled mainly by a youth generation not old enough to vote and supporters of the United Farm Workers Union’s urban boycotts, directly engaged the LAPD and the Los Angeles Unified School District in a five-year street battle demanding major educational reforms, an end to status quo political marginalization, and protests to reform the hated LAPD (Marin 1991). In the aftermath of this political opposition, urban social movements addressing land use and planning policies first challenged urban policy cartels in the region. The symbolic center, East L.A., became the focal point of political empowerment and oppositional consciousness. The Eastside barrio had matured into a community focused on challenging a history of racist relations that characterized California. The youth movement also inspired other communities to protest and resist.

East Los Angeles as a “State of Mind,” and the Specter of a Chicana/o-Dominated Urban Future One important demographic factor hovered over both the transformation of the expanding geography of East L.A. and the Chicano Power Era. These were projections that Chicanas/os would eventually become the largest ethnic group not only in Southern California, but the entire state within two generations. Although constituting only 18 percent of the population in Los Angeles County in 1970 (Clark 1996, 115), demographers analyzing natural birth rates and migration patterns determined that by the end of the century Chicanas/os would constitute the largest ethnic group in Southern California. These projections created a sense of fear and trepidation within Euro-American society. The logic of a permanent minority underclass, subserviently meeting the low-

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wage labor demands of the regional economy, was eroding. Numerical superiority also meant political empowerment if not control in the near future. A mural in the Estrada Courts public housing development symbolically shattered this older state of ethnic relations. The mural, focused at commuters traveling to the civic center on Olympic Blvd., portrayed Che Guevara, pointing a finger and stating “We Are Not A Minority” (Dunitz and Prigoff 1997). This mural crystalized the social, economic, and political challenges that the Chicana/o community, emanating from East L.A., would pose to the political establishment in the Southwest within a generation. The suburban expansion in the post-World War II period had a negative spatial impact on East L.A. The construction of five separate freeway corridors through the community permanently ruptured spatial patterns and reconstituted social relations between previously contiguous neighborhoods. Massive swaths of affordable housing were demolished through eminent domain. The era of construction accelerated the demise of vibrant barrios. State and city officials completely neglected an assessment of the loss of housing, the negative economic impact on the Eastside, and future environmental consequences related to air pollution. One result was that East L.A. could no longer address the housing demands of a majority of Chicanas/os in the region. The loss of housing and constant population expansion compelled families to seek housing in other sectors of the region. This period of transition did not diminish East L.A.’s predominance as the cultural and symbolic center of the region’s Chicana/o community. In relation to youth culture, Whittier Blvd. retained its social significance as a place to meet. It was the center of Chicana/o car culture on weekends, a cultural practice that had begun in the 1940s. Each weekend thousands of youth cruised the boulevard, in a social ritual that transformed Whittier Blvd. into a culturally important social space that was internally developed and nurtured. It was only in the aftermath of the turbulent 1960s and 1970s that Los Angeles County forced an end to this social practice by closing down the entire boulevard on weekends. A music scene based on a few major rock and roll bands, along with popular nightclubs, also made the Eastside the most influential weekend destination for Chicanas/os throughout Los Angeles through the 1970s. The gradual out-migration did not alter the cultural allegiance to the community. East L.A. transcended its own geography. Most families who left in search of housing opportunities retained ties to the Eastside through other family members and social networks. Families planned special events and cultural celebrations in the barrio. This connection to East L.A. culture was essential to their identity. The social movement of the 1960s also resulted in the reinstitution of cultural fiestas and parades. Cinco de Mayo and Diez y Seis de Septembre are now celebrated in numerous communities, whereas prior to the 1980s these events were only “allowed” in East L.A. There was (and is) a significant infrastructure of culturally-oriented food, clothing, music, and other ethnic products. In the new millennium, East L.A. gang culture still retains an urban suburban lineage in which Chicana/o youth join Eastside street gangs while residing a substantial distance away in Chicana/o working-class suburbs (Vigil 2002). By the mid-1970s, East L.A. was not only a critical system of urban spatial and social relations, it was also a “state of mind” in relation to the changing urbanization patterns of Chicanas/os in Southern California.

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The actions of East L.A. activists, along with political progressives throughout the Southwest, signaled a transformative change in regional political and social institutions. They demanded structural social, political, and economic reforms to address the ravages of racism, which socially constructed barrios into a de facto system of residential apartheid (Acuna 1988). This forced many Euro-Americans to reconstruct their worldview in relation to minority communities. Activists demanded three reforms: affirmative action, changes in college admissions policies, and anti-discrimination legislation to increase housing opportunities. The next two decades created a new reality in the urban policy arena. The historic Chicana/o barrio, once centered solely within the confines of East L.A., had expanded far beyond its original political boundary. Chicanas/os ushered in a significant transition in the ethnic composition of neighborhoods and cities throughout the region. Chicana/o residential patterns reached from downtown Los Angeles into the middle of the San Gabriel Valley, twenty miles to the east. Pomona was shifting from a predominantly Euro-American community into a multi-ethnic Chicana/o and Afro-American city. The east and central San Fernando Valley also experienced a substantial in-migration of Chicanas/os during this decade. Although in percentage terms this migration was modest, it portended a substantial long-term transformation in ethnic composition of the entire region. Euro-Americans began moving to newer suburbs further from the urban core, opening housing opportunities for Chicanas/os in neighborhoods that only a decade earlier would have openly—and sometimes violently—opposed diversity. The suburbanization of Chicanas/os changed the social and political contours of the region. A number of working-class, predominantly Chicana/o, suburbs resulted from the anticipated population growth and the limited housing supply in East L.A. It also created a bifurcated Chicana/o community. The Civil Rights movement opened a new vista of economic opportunities and mobility for a younger generation that was able to move to the suburbs, leaving traditional barrios for improved housing and educational opportunity. East L.A., along with barrios throughout California, retained an aging population, new immigrants seeking affordable shelter, poverty, a failed educational system, and a gang crisis. Initially, communities and independent cities in proximity to East L.A. experienced the most significant level of demographic changes. By the late 1970s a number of cities had become majority Chicana/o, including Montebello, Bell Gardens, Bell, Commerce, and South San Gabriel. Within Los Angeles, Chicana/o population increases were most notable in the eastern San Fernando Valley, Silverlake, and East Hollywood and portions of South Central Los Angeles. The neighborhoods directly west of the civic center had also become overwhelmingly Latina/o. Central Los Angeles was surrounded by predominately Chicano/Latino neighborhoods. In fact, a ring approximately five miles in diameter consisted almost solely of barrios, new and traditional. There were sectors of other ethnic communities— Chinatown, Filipinos, and a few Euro-American areas—but these neighborhoods were situated within an urban area that was Latina/o. For example, numerous inner-city schools had over 90 percent Latina/o enrollments. The demography of central Los Angeles was also significantly impacted by the civil wars in Central America during this period. A substantial number of political and economic refugees migrated into the region (Hamilton and Chinchilla 2001).

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This new era of Chicana/o urbanism outpaced the city’s ability to meet the affordable housing demand. By the mid-1980s certain areas, in particular the central San Gabriel Valley, Southeast Los Angeles County, northern Orange County, and western San Bernardino County—experienced a significant increase in Chicanas/os in outer-ring suburban cities. In South Central Los Angeles, the predominantly Afro-American residential area also experienced significant demographic change (Grant 2000). Numerous neighborhoods transitioned into majority Chicana/o and/or immigrant Mexicana/o communities. Throughout the Los Angeles basin, west Los Angeles, the west San Fernando Valley, Long Beach, and Santa Monica, significant Chicana/o neighborhoods rapidly developed. The 1990 census confirmed earlier projections of a Chicana/o majority near the end of the century (Grant 2000). The urbanization patterns of the region, increasingly dominated by new Chicana/o in-migration into previously Euro-American areas, indicated that a restructuring of social and cultural relations had become a permanent factor in the demographic composition of the region. Another result was the expansion of suburban poverty throughout Southern California (McConville and Ong 2003). In the past two decades, the consolidation of newer Chicano neighborhoods has changed the historic role of East L.A. and shifted the locus of the community into a polynucleated system of centers (Gottdiener 1985). East L.A. no longer maintains its past role as the cultural and social center. Chicanas/os have dispersed throughout the state and region. The latest generation of youth have limited or no connection to the Eastside. Urban relations and patterns are completely internalized within suburban barrios, many of which have developed into majority Chicana/o areas in the past twenty years. The urban frame of reference of these areas has no relationship to either the Eastside and/or the city of Los Angeles. Even some barrios within the city are distant and remote from both East L.A. and the civic center. Concurrently, the urban form of Southern California has increasingly been influenced by Latina/o culture in relation to commercial districts, community fiestas, political representation, urban policy, and language. The battle of bilingual education and biculturalism (Heath 1985), a low-intensity civic war in the 1970s and 1980s, has now become a high-profile social reality.

The Transformation of Chicana/o Communities in Other Major Cities Los Angeles, due to its economy and role in the global economy, tends to dominate discussion of ethnic transformations in California. However, other major cities were also experiencing significant demographic and urban changes. As in Los Angeles, the barrio was no longer the sole, restricted area for Chicanas/os to reside. Suburban migration, similar to Los Angeles’ experience, occurred in virtually all metropolitan areas of the state. Most other cities, including San Jose, San Diego, Sacramento, Riverside, Oakland, and San Francisco, experienced significant Chicana/o growth, yet this demographic shift did not produce a majority. Chicana/o suburbanization ushered in an era of economic decline in traditional barrios. That said, these barrios retained their social and cultural significance due to their relatively compact geography.

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The cities of San Jose, San Diego, and Sacramento provide insight into how this populace transitioned from barrio-centered residential patterns into geographically broader ones. They evolved within the framework of segregated ethnic enclaves. The history of racism and discrimination in housing was not unique to Los Angeles. Barrios developed adjacent to the civic center area, a convenient distance for low-wage workers to commute to employment centers. Through the 1960s, barrios were distinctively identified with home ownership and business formation concentrated in restricted geographic zones. Few Chicanas/os had the financial capacity to move into suburban areas and/or were willing to tolerate the social harassment that was common in the late 1960s and 1970s. When legal and social conditions began to moderate, housing opportunities and improved educational systems offered alternatives to deteriorating housing conditions. San Jose and San Diego in particular followed the pattern of sprawl associated with the Los Angeles basin. San Jose expanded in all directions from the civic center due to the significant levels of undeveloped space that was prime for development. The economy was not sufficient to spur this growth, but its proximity to other Bay Area cities and employment centers made San Jose an affordable suburban zone by the mid-1970s. San Diego has benefited from three key factors: proximity to the U.S.-Mexico border, possession of a major U.S. Navy base, and optimal weather conditions. The regional economy was initially based on the military, border commerce, agriculture, and tourism. However, by the 1970s the city began an almost permanent period of urban expansion. This was attributed to families fleeing the congestion in Los Angeles, high-tech manufacturing related to newly developed universities, maquiladora expansion, demands for advanced corporate services, and the development of major tourist amenities. Growth occurred north, northeast, and east. Independent cities to the south also experienced significant growth. A number of these smaller, working-class cities—National City, Chula Vista, and San Ysidro—became majority Chicana/o during this era. Chicana/o urbanism also followed suburban expansion in San Jose and San Diego with middle-class households moving into developing suburban communities. The original barrios remained culturally important, but housing conditions continued to decline. Barrios became areas of immigrants, older home owners, and socially unstable households. The major difference to Los Angeles was the spatial relationship to the city. Barrios in these and other cities are still a convenient distance from the civic center and suburban areas. Thus, they retain their cultural and symbolic importance. The demographic transition has not been completed. Extended family members maintain residence in these barrios, thus continuing a historic lineage with the middle class in suburbs. Sacramento is another example of changing socialization patterns. The state government was a leader in ending employment discrimination during the 1970s under the Jerry Brown administration. This opened up a large number of managerial positions in a range of agencies and departments to minorities. This era of opportunity was not universal given the history of discriminatory practices in state government, but it constituted substantial change. An expanding managerial class opted for housing opportunities in newly suburbanizing areas south and north of the civic center. This shifted suburban zones from predominately Euro-American into multi-ethnic suburbs.

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Latinas/os in San Francisco had a different urban experience. The high cost of space has limited options to expand beyond the historic Mission District and adjacent neighborhoods. Through the period of suburban expansion, San Francisco actually lost population (DeLeon 1992). The city has not reproduced an adequate supply of affordable housing. The nonprofit sector in the Mission has developed a few housing projects, but unfortunately they are not sufficient to address local demand. Middle-class Chicanas/os have opted to move out of the city into Contra Costa County or suburbs in the south where housing costs are reasonable. The problem with Mission District housing is its aging and declining condition, the cost of housing in the city, and the quality of local schools. Also, the community has not substantially increased relative to citywide growth trends. Chicana/o population increases have occurred in a few East Bay communities— Richmond, Union City, Hayward, and Oakland. Conversely, Chicana/o urban patterns in San Francisco have remained relatively stable during the last three decades. The housing markets in both San Francisco and San Jose have created serious affordability problems. The historic evolution of the high technology industry in Silicon Valley forced land values to unprecedented levels in the late 1990s. The issue of affordable housing, already problematic, turned into a severe crisis (Pastor et al. 2000). High-tech-driven property values complicated land values even in the most deteriorated areas close to the expanding Silicon Valley. Technology-generated new wealth entered the Mission District housing market and rapidly gentrified the entire community, forcing working-class families out of the city (Solnit and Schwartzenberg 2000). In the city of San Jose, Chicanas/os have had to decide between higher housing costs and longer commutes. On the verge of a major social housing crisis, the recent economic crash of the overheated high technology sector has mitigated this affordability crisis to a limited extent. However, the affordability crisis in both cities remains vulnerable to future periods of rapid acceleration of land values due to the unique proximity to the Silicon Valley economy. Another major difference between Los Angeles and two of the major cities is political. Both San Jose and Sacramento have elected Chicano mayors. These historic elections were crucial events of political empowerment and influence on social policy. However, no major city has yet to achieve a Chicana/o majority at the city council level. Los Angeles and other cities have only experienced modest proportional representation. The number of elected officials is far below current population percentages.

The Arena of Urban and Land Use Challenges in California Current projections indicate that California’s population will increase by almost 50 percent during the next quarter century from the current 36 million. When this population projection is achieved Chicanas/os will constitute a significant majority. Essentially, within four generations this ethnic group will have expanded from less than 10 percent of the population to over half of the largest state in the nation. Led by California, Latinas/os have become the second largest ethnic group in the United States (DeSipio and de la Garza 2002). This demographic transformation, especially pronounced in urban areas of the Southwest, Chicago, Miami, and New York, mandates a shift in focus related to urban policy. Urbanization patterns, social policy, land use issues, and environmental

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contradictions will all necessarily involve considerations related to Chicana/o-oriented urban policy issues and barrio urbanism. Latinas/os and Asians, the two fastest growing ethnic groups (Waldinger and Lee 2001), with substantial population bases in the West and Southwest, are at the vanguard of a new era of multi-ethnic urban policy development. The sheer scale of population growth will force fundamental changes in land use and urban policy in the future. Where to house another 16 to 18 million people in California is a complex challenge. This tremendous growth will place additional pressure on the limited supply of affordable housing, public and highway transportation systems, educational institutions, employment generation, urban revitalization, environmental degradation, youth issues, social policy, and open space. These issues must be addressed in comprehensive fashion if the state is to make progress in managing the built environment and the restructuring of spatial relations (Bobo et al. 2000). For instance, California university officials are already planning for “Tidal Wave II,” the substantial increase in admissions into colleges by young adults from the Baby Boom generation. This includes a substantial percentage of Latina/o youth transitioning into colleges, mainly public supported. Thus, planning for another future population wave has commenced at the state and local levels. Chicana/o public officials and policy makers are engaged in this process to address the future urban and social demands on macro and micro levels. Chicanas/os currently compose approximately 40 percent of the state’s populace. In Southern California numerous cities have substantial Chicana/o majorities. The trajectory of this sector of the population indicates that in all major cities Chicanas/os will either constitute an absolute majority or the largest ethnic group. This translates into increased demands for a new urban policy focusing on the reconstruction of colonias and barrios. The battle over funding and resources has already commenced, and it will only become increasingly contested terrain in the future. Growth-related issues have become a major focus of the state legislature. Fragmented local and regional governmental structures have failed to address a range of land use issues. Affordable housing production, environmental pollution, transportation gridlock, economic development, infrastructure maintenance, and open space are dealt with in a system of fractured governance with limited regional accountability (Fogelson 1967). In response to this managerial ineptitude within planning, the state legislature authorized two major reports focusing on land use conflicts and infrastructure funding issues related to future population projections (California State Senate 1988; Assembly Office of Research 1987). With regard to the urban crises of barrios, the state legislature may be the only avenue to force local government policy to begin implementation of revitalization actions directly benefiting barrios, delayed since the 1970s. At one level, the policy makers views the future with trepidation. How will the state accommodate a substantial population increase? Can a deteriorating educational system improve and respond to future demands of a technologically-driven global economy? What type of open space will remain if sprawl and construction activity maintains its current pace? What type of densities should urban areas mandate in the future? What is the negative impact of NIMBYITE (“not in my backyard”) forces demanding an end to housing permits and urban expansion in a confrontation against policy initiatives

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addressing this population increase? How will marginalized, working-class constituencies enter directly into the decision-making process? These policy dilemmas are increasingly the problems that confront predominantly Chicana/o urban cities and communities. The future of barrio spatial relations, and its contradiction, suburban sprawl, present competing challenges to state and local officials. The resolution requires a Chicana/o perspective on urban policy. Land use and planning controversies loom large in the future. Development policy, especially a change in allowable density—which middle-class factions have historically resisted (DeLeon and Powell 1985; Molotch and Logan 1984)—is at the center of this debate over growth. The reality is that California’s urban areas will continue to expand. Whether land use policy shifts to provide for higher density, which it must if sprawl begins to swallow a significant portion of the remaining agricultural lands and open space in the state, is the crucial issue. Complicating these issues is the inherent conflict between intensified land use patterns and the serious environmental problems that currently haunt California planning policy. The notorious air pollution crisis in the Los Angeles Basin is only the most prominent among a host of other state and regional problems. Mass consumer society generates more trash than current capacity can adequately address, sprawl is consuming agricultural lands in the central San Joaquin Valley, toxic waste sites also have too little capacity, coastal pollution remains problematic, water resources from the north demanded by the pro-growth south are constantly at risk, and transportation gridlock only grows worse. In Los Angeles, 50 percent of Latinas/os live in zones with the highest concentrations of air pollution (Lipsitz 1995). The city based solely on manufacturing with the highest concentration of industrial toxic pollution, Commerce, is majority Chicana/o (Boone and Modarres 1999). California culture is in reality the apex of consumption-driven social practices in an advanced industrial economy that acts as if there is no limit to regional or global environmental capacities (Cahn 1995; O’Conner 1994; Diaz 2001). And the state’s leaders exhibit no courage to change either social consumption practices or land development patterns in a manner that will allow the state to cope with a 50 percent increase in population. In spite of significant improvements mandated by the State Air Resources Board and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), smog remains problematic. Minority communities are vulnerable to negative public health impacts stemming from high levels of air pollution (Pansing et al. 1989; Bullard 1994; Diaz 2001). Since numerous barrios are dissected by freeways near civic centers, they are subjected to heavy peak hour air pollution twice a day. In addition, because of the failure to regulate diesel emissions used by both public transportation agencies and school district buses, Chicana/o youth and seniors suffer from heavy particulate diesel emissions throughout the day and intense air pollution from tens of thousands of vehicles in congested routes ringing barrios. Inland desert and/or rural development patterns have become the primary focus of the development industry during the past fifteen years. High land values and scarce land along coastal corridors, especially in built-out sectors of the state, has created an impetus to search for cheap desert, rural, and agricultural lands on the fringe of metropolitan areas for further urban expansion. This has exacerbated gridlock and sprawl, and has created what amounts to “SUV environmentalism”—meaning an environmental movement that has structurally failed to address consumption patterns in the United States.

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The crux of this environmental crisis is that land use policy in the state is within a convoluted, fractured web of different governmental jurisdictions. New suburbs for the Los Angeles basin are being marketed in the Mojave Desert. Newly developing residential areas for the Bay Area are under construction in the Central Valley. Suburbs of San Diego are thirty miles north of downtown. Affordable housing for middle-class labor in San Jose is forcing commuters north into the East Bay. The state only relies on freeways. There is no adequate rail system addressing this relationship between cheap land and long commutes. One of the most important social policy issues is affordable housing. The state and federal governments have a weak record of enforcement actions mandating that local governments address the affordable housing supply issue. Rarely has the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) utilized its regulatory powers to insure that localities actually develop affordable housing for working families. State officials have the power to reject general plans that do not adequately address the production of affordable housing. But historically, they have been dormant. Thus cities ignore this requirement or lobby elected officials to overrule state agencies that question their lack of compliance. The affordability crisis in Los Angeles is one of the worst in the nation (Housing Crisis Task Force 2000). The previous mayor budgeted paltry funding for affordable housing production, preferring to rely on private sector initiatives and civic centeroriented development. Numerous families cannot afford adequate shelter, even with two parents working full time. Often, they are spending 50 to 70 percent of monthly income on housing (Housing Crisis Task Force 2000). While New York was expending over $200 million a year on affordable housing, Los Angeles was budgeting less that $10 million in the 1990s (in addition to HUD funds). Middle- and upper-class resistance to funding renovation of the dense urban core has precluded cities from comprehensively addressing this issue. The question is whether this anti-density psychology will persist or elected officials will change zoning policy to support initiatives to substantially increase the housing supply. Nowhere is the ethnic and class divide in California more pronounced that in the debate over housing production. Two issues impacting barrios in relation to the affordable housing supply crisis are pressure on land values and densification. Barrio land values will increase if urban densities also increase. This will have negative consequences for home ownership. Higher values will force competition with land speculators as developable land, whereever it exists, becomes increasingly profitable, especially in high-density zones. In addition, higher densities often lead to overcrowded schools, inadequate recreational amenities and serious social problems correlated to poverty and density. If cities fail to address these issues, the policy will only serve to intensify the crisis of the barrio. The fixed rail strategy in Los Angeles has been a political, financial, and transportation quagmire (Ohland and Diaz 1994). Public disgust in relation to problems with construction of the Red Line subway system led directly to an initiative in 1997, in which county voters banned any future subway construction without a ballot initiative. The subway is a paltry eighteen miles, and has a minimal impact on regional transportation. A populist group, the Bus Riders Union, filed a lawsuit against the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), which resulted in a federal consent decree to substantially improve bus service (Burgos and Pulido 1998). The court action alleged

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class discrimination in regional transportation policy, in which the construction of a suburban-oriented rail system had a devastating impact on bus service (Burgos and Pulido 1998). Prior to construction of the Red Line, the bus system had approximately 1.2 million daily boardings. Within six years this figure had declined to 920,000 boardings, an almost 25 percent loss of passengers in a period of population expansion. MTA officials have attempted to undermine if not ignore the consent decree almost from the day it was signed. There have been innumerable court hearings since the decision. MTA has constantly stalled implementation of bus system improvements while continuing to fully fund a rail system that does not fundamentally address the transportation crisis. The bus system’s patrons are overwhelmingly lower-wage Latina/o workers, students, and seniors who cannot afford car ownership. A few other cities, following the Bay Area’s Rapid Transit (BART) system, have begun to develop light rail projects to address regional congestion. San Diego and Sacramento have implemented the initial phase of what are planned to become comprehensive regional rail systems. San Jose has a limited light rail line. In combination, these cities are only at the inception of a projected strategy, not fully funded, that may alleviate the transportation crisis. Constant growth and car culture have left a majority of cities with no alternative other than more roads. Most cities exhibit poor, if not abysmal, public transportation systems. This reality of constant congestion has direct, negative economic costs related to lost work hours and delays in transportation of products and supplies (Gordon 1991). The state faces a future of worsening gridlock with no solution. The high cost of insurance, car maintenance, and parking has made car ownership difficult. A significant workingclass constituency is dependent on public transportation to address daily transit demands.

The California Economy California’s economy has achieved a level of growth that is unmatched for a specific province in developed countries. The state is the fifth largest economy in the world. This diversified economy has also created a substrata of ethnic enclave economies that have revitalized deteriorated communities and developed new opportunities for growth. The economic expansion, however, has resulted in a skewed distribution of wealth. On a national basis, the top 20 percent of households have substantially improved their economic status while middle- and lower-class incomes have either stagnated or decreased in relation to inflation (Bluestone and Harrison 2000). A significant percentage of Chicanas/os are situated in these lower strata of the economy (McConville and Ong 2003), locked in positions where wage increases have been minuscule and advancement extremely limited. Employment generation has not translated into increased earning power, and barrio businesses have suffered from lower expendable incomes. Business expansion in the barrio economy is difficult, with mainly only small entrepreneurs willing to risk investment within a consumer base with relatively lower household incomes. A few businesses have successfully capitalized on opportunities in barrios, in particular ones focusing on food and consumer goods. Enclave economies possess substantial purchasing power, but there are higher risks in relation to consumer credit, bankruptcies, and access

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to capital (Light and Gold 2000). In a period of major new investment in the state, barrio economies have had difficulty in attracting new investors. In conjunction with modest achievements by state-sponsored industrial redevelopment, the lack of reinvestment has negatively impacted job generation. Barrios are confronted with higher unemployment rates, retailers offering minimum-wage positions, deteriorating commercial districts, marginal businesses, and constrained capability to expand beyond an enclave economy. Population growth has led to modest increases in expendable income, which supports the small business structure of barrios. However, increases in cumulative income have not structurally changed the condition— physical or financial—of barrio economic zones. Redevelopment policy has not significantly impacted these commercial districts. Chicana/o businesses have benefited from affirmative action in government and corporate purchasing, a factor which is not always correlated with barrio economies. This increase in economic opportunity often is located in other sectors of the regional economy and capital is not necessarily recirculated through these commercial districts’ Empowerment Zones and Enterprise Zones—two signature redevelopment strategies of the past decade—have not had a substantial impact on barrios. These zones, located mainly in declining or abandoned industrial areas, have not experienced major reinvestment over the past two decades. There have been a few successful project areas, in particular Pacoima (Los Angeles), but even this community has not been transformed by the creation of a substantial level of new higher salaried positions in relation to these programs. The manufacturing center, which is the focus of these programs, has suffered from three major problems that have never been solved: downsizing, global mobility, and competition from newly industrializing countries (Sassen 1991). The result has been a decrease in higher-paying positions, a reliance on new immigrants, and reduction in job security and earning power (ibid.; Bluestone and Harrison 1982). The irony is that significant capacity exists in industrial zones adjacent to where unemployment problems are the most severe in the regional economy. Numerous underutilized or vacant industrial sites near barrios, which could potentially employ thousands of workers, continue to deteriorate and remain urban wastelands. State-centered redevelopment and reinvestment strategies have generally ignored Chicana/o small businesses interests. The reasons vary—a mismatch in demand and composition of businesses, lack of capitalization, narrow business focus, and location of services. The results, after thirty years of state programs, are depressing, as depressed as numerous barrio economic zones. Emerging Chicana/o leaders have to challenge the civic-centered strategy to force cities to reinvest in declining barrio economies. One positive change in the economy of the barrio and the Chicana/o business community is the increasingly important role of Latinas in politics, business, and society. Development and expansion within Chicana-owned business is one of the fastest growing sectors in the state’s economy (Davila 2001). A new era of demands for inclusion, led by Chicana businesswomen, has reshaped the configuration of this community. It is within this arena that the benefits of access to college and Affirmative Action are most pronounced. The most marginalized sector of the barrio economy has become an important influence, locally and regionally. Chicanas have entered both traditional and nontraditional sectors of the economy. In particular, they have increased their participation in professional and service sectors (Davila 2001). Within the barrio

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economy, women have continued to participate in a few areas: personal services, food, and retail.

Three Major Social Issues The revitalization of urban barrios is not solely centered on land use and economic issues. A significant percentage of the population is under eighteen years old, which presents a number of other policy challenges. Cities are alienating social environments. The culture of barrios differentiates itself from other communities by the level of personal interaction and vibrant street culture (Gamez 2002; Rojas 1999). The interactive pedestrian-oriented behavioral patterns create a sense of strong social networks and an active use of public space. Barrio social life is reminiscent of an era when walking was the focal point of socialization. This humanistic pace of life, based on both culture and economics, has evolved into the development of an ethnically centered, user-scaled environment. A major component of street culture is the younger generation. In addressing youth issues, there are three major unsolved crises. There is a major deficit in the availability of open space and recreational opportunities. Urban parks in dense neighborhoods are poorly maintained, lack basic amenities, and are spatially inadequate. Los Angeles is one of the worst cities in the nation in terms of open space and parks available to barrios. The public education system has not significantly improved during the past half century. In numerous school districts, Chicana/o dropout rates are over 20 percent (Valenzuela 1999), and in other districts this figure is over 40 percent. The academic performance of Latina/o youth has historically been lower than other ethnic groups. Bilingual education, a key demand of the high school blowouts in 1968, has been a highly contested and controversial issue. Numerous school districts have experienced serious problems in implementing quality bilingual programs, along with resistance in the teaching profession against this approach to educational policy (Gandara 2002). California voters passed Proposition 227, an anti-bilingual education measure that has complicated public education for Latinas/os (Gandara 2002). Alienation within a society with a history of discrimination, unmet urban demands and police harassment is responsible, to some degree, for the serious, interrelated problem of gangs, substance abuse, and urban violence. The linkage between problematic urban social issues and alienated youth manifested in gang culture is entering into its fifth or sixth generation in some instances. This subculture, a component of barrio culture, has been a terrible influence on younger generations and has produced many innocent victims. This crisis, seemingly permanent, is evident in the high percentage of minorities in state prison systems (Vigil 1988). Urban policy in this context is not narrowly situated in physical form—it has a specific socialization impact in which marginalized social sectors react to the continual decomposition of spatial relations. The level of violence, accelerated in the past fifteen years during the crack cocaine wars, negatively impacted property values and neighborhood stability. Gun violence, random gang encounters, and planned attacks only subsided in the mid-1990s. It is a major reason for middle-class flight into suburbia. Housing revitalization is unfortunately

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reliant on small construction firms willing to factor in the impact of urban violence on property values. There are youth advocates attempting to reduce violence and develop alternatives to gang culture (Vigil 1988). While valiant and progressive, these programs are grossly underfunded. In fact, the massive level of social expenditures addressing the consequences of urban violence after the fact dwarfs the amount invested in prevention programs (Vigil 1988). Indeed barrios, in lieu of a concerted, proactive approach to community revitalization, experience regressive reinvestment. Hundreds of millions in tax dollars are allocated to institutions designed only to control alienated and marginalized sectors of the city (prisons in particular). The crisis in public education within urban barrios is an historical tragedy. The underinvestment in minority schools is legendary. Educational reform in grades K-12, designed to break historic barriers to college, was one of the key demands of the Civil Rights era. Currently, a new era of constant testing has been implemented to gauge student achievement. The results have not fundamentally changed the fact that urban school systems have not structurally reduced the performance gap among Latina/o youth (Valenzuela 1999; Gandara 2002). This crisis, a permanent reality in barrio educational institutions, has urban and economic policy implications. Limited academic achievement translates into lower household income and a worsened potential for career mobility. Thus, poor quality education results in an underclass with limited employment potential. The high level of high school dropouts essentially places a significant sector of the population in the streets, with crime and antisocial behavior a frequent result. The final issue, open space and recreational policy, is an important resource for addressing youth alienation (Cranz 1982; Gold 1973). Recreational opportunities offer proactive alternatives and are an indication of how society values younger generations. This demand is especially pronounced in lower-income communities with limited household resources for leisure and travel. However, urban land use policy has not incorporated sufficient open space for inner-city neighborhoods. There is a major deficit in the amount of available parks and open space within barrios. Most cities are currently confronted with expensive propositions for expanding open space in dense districts. But cities view parks as a nonessential function with a low budgetary priority. Added to this, parks and recreational programs are vulnerable to periodic fiscal state crises. California did recently pass the first major park acquisition bond measure, Proposition 12, in a generation. The measure specifically targeted lower income urban areas for park land expenditures. This is a start, but the deficit in open space will require substantial funding increases that now appear remote.

The Changing Political Arena of California In the past decade Chicana/o political advances at the state and local levels have initiated the transformation of power relations in California. A number of small and mid-sized cities have elected their first Chicana/o majorities. A few major cities have elected their first Chicana/o mayors in over a century. The state legislature has experienced a

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significant increase in Chicana/o representation in both the Assembly and the State Senate. This shift is a result of three important factors: term limits, increased voter registration, and a political backlash to the overtly racist anti-immigrant proposals advocated by ex-governor Pete Wilson. The move toward political power has been accompanied by a new focus on urban policy and an assessment of the impact of population growth on urban barrios in the state. This evolution from a marginalized, politically excluded community into conventional positions of power has a rich history. Chicanas/os were virtually powerless only a generation ago when few cities had only token representation. The first Chicana/o elected to the city council of Los Angeles last century occurred in 1949. The next one was elected in 1987. When Gloria Molina was elected in 1989, it was the first time two Chicanas/os served simultaneously. Achieving the current level of political power required a long, arduous struggle, yet representation that truly reflects the state’s current population is far off. In the 1940s through the 1960s, (now retired) congressman Ed Roybal was the only major elected Chicano politician in California. In the 1960s two important movements began to revive Chicana/o political aspirations. The labor struggles of campesinos, led by the United Farm Workers Union, became an influential catalyst for the broader community. The UFW was fighting for union recognition and workplace improvements against the powerful agriculture industry. The union developed a range of tactics designed to publicize their struggle outside of the rural San Joaquin Valley. The urbanoriented grape boycott and subsequent victory was the first avenue of political education for the Chicana/o youth generation. The high school student walkouts in Spring of 1968 ignited a five-year period of conflict and confrontation with police and political authority in Los Angeles. The Student Movement, influenced by the Civil Rights struggles and urban insurrections, openly contested political exclusion and discrimination. It transcended a generational divide, with parents and community leaders supporting the students’ fight against the unified school district and the LAPD (Acuna 1984). It became a foundation for political inclusion and the dismantling of racist governmental and political institutions. In the vanguard of the historic struggle for political inclusion were two politically powerless sectors of nonvoters—campesinos aligned with the UFW, mainly immigrant laborers, and East L.A. high school students too young to vote. Their victories emboldened Chicanas/os to actively engage in political activity. In response to the creation of La Raza Unida Party, the Democratic Party was forced to field candidates in districts with high percentages of Chicana/o voters (Garcia 1989). Democrats were fearful that this new party would consolidate the political demands and lead a new party that would elect Chicanas/os who represented their peers for the first time in the Southwest. The youth movement viewed the “Partido” as the only viable option for political empowerment (ibid.). In the late 1960s and early 1970s, a trickle of Chicanos were endorsed by the Democratic Party in campaigns for the state legislature in reaction to the looming impact of the Partido in the Southwest (Garcia 1989). The vacuum in political leadership and representation at the local level was assumed by urban social movements that focused on revitalization and redevelopment policy. Led by community-based organizations, these movements had no political leverage, since few Chicanas/os served on city councils. Public protest, lobbying federal agencies, and the

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court system were avenues to force change and empower minorities in the determination of their urban future (Browning et al. 1984). They focused attention on the lack of production of affordable housing, community advisory panels that lacked barrio representatives, limited economic development in barrios, and barriers toward accessing HUD documents and financial reports housed in city halls. This period of activism achieved only limited improvements in relation to urban policy and political representation. Civic elites were resistant to the transformation of political relations that the Chicano Power era had anticipated. Demographic changes in the 1980s had not yet substantially altered voting patterns, and thus Chicanas/os experienced difficulties in winning citywide elections in which the Euro-American electorate was focused on maintaining racial hegemony in government. Conversely, the legislature experienced a gradual increase in Chicana/o representation due mainly to voting rights lawsuits against Democratic party redistricting proposals from 1970 to 1990. From 1968 to 1995, Chicana/o advances in electoral politics arena were painfully modest. Conversely, the projected population increases had begun to significantly impact the state. Through this period, barrios were often represented by older Euro-American incumbents who were permanent fixtures, rarely challenged by Chicanas/os who could generate adequate campaign financial support. There was a high degree of frustration in relation to the acute lack of political influence at the state and local levels. Community activists had to continually rely on the courts to successfully challenge redistricting plans that limited the impact of barrio voting blocs. In addition, a substantial percentage of the community simply did not apply for citizenship or register to vote. Thus, their political ascendancy was blunted. Electoral change and occasional majorities occurred mainly in small and mid-sized cities. Two dynamics had a significant impact: the adoption of term limits for state offices and the strident anti-immigrant attacks launched by former governor Pete Wilson leading up to the 1996 Republican Party primary for president. Term limits forced incumbents out of office, ushering in an unprecedented era of change in the state legislature. The main beneficiaries have been women and the Chicana/o community. The potential envisioned two decades earlier, when demographers projected Chicana/o majorities in the state, were finally being translated into tangible political power. The other factor is directly related to racism (Saito 1998; Guzman 1966). Thengovernor Wilson attempted to distinguish himself among Republican voters by supporting a series of blatantly anti-immigrant and anti-Chicano initiatives designed as wedge issues to push conservatives to the polls (Chavez and Martinez 1996). Wilson positioned himself as a champion against immigration and Affirmative Action. One initiative, Proposition 187, was a direct attack on immigrant families (Chavez and Martinez 1996). A provision mandated that children of immigrants could not receive a public education since their parents were not citizens. Another initiative proposed to dismantle Affirmative Action policies, including the state college system. Both initiatives succeeded in subsequent elections in the mid-1990s. California’s politics had become highly controversial and ethnically polarized. Governor Wilson viewed this strategy as a successful platform for his quest for the Republican presidential primary. However, neither he nor the Republican Party anticipated the counter-movement that emerged in reaction to his anti-Latina/o platform.

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Latina/o immigrants rebelled against Wilson’s inherent racism and role in sponsoring Propositions 187 and 226. Legal immigrants changed their view toward political participation. In the tens of thousands, they applied for citizenship and subsequently registered to vote. The voter participation in barrios began a historic increase during the mid-1990s. This was the dawn of a new era of civic participation and voting within the community. In conjunction with term limits, this newly energized voting bloc had a major impact on the composition of the state legislature. By the late 1990s, Chicanas/os constituted one of the most significant voting blocs in state government. During the height of the Wilson administration, Republicans won a majority of the state assembly for the first time in over thirty years. Within two years, they lost almost 40 percent of their seats and reverted to a distinct minority status in both houses. Chicana/o voting patterns were the major difference. The political backlash against the Wilson era has permanently placed Chicanas/os at the center of state politics. In late 1998, a Chicano assemblyperson was elected Speaker of the Assembly, the second most powerful position in state government. Chicanas/os have now begun to focus on statewide offices with significant power—the U.S. Senate and the governor’s office. Cruz Bustamante, the first Chicano speaker, was elected Lieutenant Governor, becoming the first statewide Chicano officeholder since the 1880s. With a significant increase in legislators, urban policy has become an important issue in the state legislature. Chicana/o committee chairs have empaneled commissions researching urban and environmental policy. They are engaged in deliberations that are developing state-level strategies to address the land use, environmental, and urban impacts of projected population growth. They have been instrumental in two major state bond initiatives focused on school financing and open space. The 2001 mayor’s race in Los Angeles constituted the first time a major Chicana/o candidacy competed for this powerful position in over 120 years. But he was unable to shift even a small percentage of conservative voters, which was the difference in the election. In a reflection of the past, conservative Euro-American voting blocs remain resistant to the prospect of Latina/o political empowerment. Conversely, given the demographic changes in the Southwest, a Chicana/o achieving mayoral office is no longer an accomplishment in twenty-first century California. However, the first Chicana/o governor in Texas or California will transform U.S. politics.

PART IV The Future of Urban Policy in the Southwest

12 The New Cities of the Southwest The demographic trajectory of Chicanas/os during the past quarter century has produced a reconstruction of social, political, and economic relations in the Southwest. Urban expansion is now correlated to minority migration into suburbs and lower-income zones (Suro and Singer 2002; Mendez 2003). Analysis of the 2000 census confirms this bifurcation of Chicana/o urbanism (Suro and Singer 2002; Mendez 2003). Lower-income barrios, either in historic locations or newer working-class suburbs, continue to be an urban entry point for immigrant low-wage labor. The expansion in barrio urban patterns is a response to global and regional economic demands for low-wage labor (Rodriguez 1993). Middle- and upper-income households are following previous trends toward outmigration to suburban areas with higher-quality housing and social amenities. These trends are due mainly to Civil Rights-era reforms addressing housing and employment discrimination. Ending the ethnic apartheid system of residential segregation has changed the regional ethnic composition, particularly in suburban communities. Sprawl, the main urban form of Sunbelt cities since the 1950s (Perry and Watkins 1977), now incorporates a range of ethnic groups. Migration from barrios has significantly impacted ethnic diversity in all metropolitan regions. Phoenix, Denver, San Antonio, San Jose, Dallas-Fort Worth, Albuquerque, and Tucson have experienced an era of growth patterns stimulated, in part, by the new Chicana/o middle-class and the lack of quality housing in inner-city areas. This dynamic period has changed social and political relations in these urban areas. Urban policy has evolved to incorporate two basic constituencies: lower-income barrios and economically stable suburban areas. The perception of a monolithic, low-income community no longer characterizes this social sector. In fact, in the Southwest, numerous suburban zones are majority Chicana/o. Population trends indicate that, by 2020, most cities of the Southwest will have either a Chicana/o majority population or that this group will constitute the largest ethnic group (Camarillo and Bonilla 2001). Demographic change implies competing urban visions and demands. Transportation, land use, environment, and open space policy will necessarily be contested among differing class interests. This is a new era of urban policy in which divergent class interests within the Latina/o community will place a range of contradictory demands on the state. For instance, Chicanas/os residing in suburban Sacramento are supportive of light rail lines linking outer ring areas with the civic center. They are competing with barrio residents dependent on bus service improvements for transportation funds. Phoenix suburbanites who support freeway extensions west and northwest of the central city will continue to compete with barrios in the southern sector of the city for funds related to urban infrastructure. The gentrification of Barelas in Albuquerque is increasing pressure for availability of working-class housing. In effect, these policy challenges are similar to the class divide that characterized an earlier period of suburban and urban conflicts (Garcia 2003).

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Irrespective of this new suburban reality, lower-income barrios continue to demand intense interest at the local level. Barrios have expanded both in terms of form and density. The most notable example is East Los Angeles (East L.A.), which is now at the center of an expanding urban zone that, in essence, is an internal Chicana/o City. It is no longer a narrow, insulated barrio in one corner of Los Angeles. The greater Eastside, appropriately identified by Valle and Torres (2000), extends over twenty miles in a section east of downtown. If this area was an independent, incorporated area, it would cover well over 1,000 square miles. This region, which extends east, south, and north of the original East L.A. barrio, is the single largest conurban area of Chicanas/os anywhere. Although it encompasses a number of small suburban cities, the urban policy demands of this subregion of the county are still conventional: affordable housing, commercial district redevelopment, infrastructure reconstruction, and social issues. A key issue in Los Angeles County is coordination between a range of political jurisdictions and the state’s capability to fund urban programs for this massive area. Houston’s Magnolia and Segunda Barrios have expanded to encompass a major region of Chicana/o urbanism east of the civic center. They developed from highly segregated zones that, together, constituted a small section of the city during the first half of the past century (Garcia 2000). These barrios typified Chicana/o urbanism in its early form. Dilapidated housing conditions, no urban systems within the barrio, poor street systems, no internal sewer lines, and extreme poverty were all characteristics of these neighborhoods. These barrios evolved in an economy that was based on a “caste character” (Sanchez 1993), an economy in which Euro-American elites exerted total dominance over low-wage labor, residential patterns, politics, and the totality of sociopolitical relations. Through mid-century, Chicana/o barrios, by social practice and legal sanctions, maintained a highly restricted urban form that virtually locked the entire community into systemic uneven development. Housing conditions and availability remained inadequate in relation to demand, and thus overcrowding and structural decomposition were unavoidable. However, the gradual demographic changes in Houston would eventually lead to a significant spatial expansion of the eastern sector’s minority populace. Population growth in Segunda Barrio and Magnolia, the center of the community, was the key factor in changing the geography of these barrios. In the modern period, both zones merged into adjacent neighborhoods, thereby significantly increasing the visibility of Chicanas/os in central Houston (Rodriguez 1993). This merge occurred in response to regional economic expansion and a resultant reliance on low wage immigrant labor pools (Rodriguez 1993). While both barrios have experienced a significant middle-class outmigration since the mid-1970s, they have remained ethnically stable, cultural enclaves. They remain the main locational area for low wage immigrant labor and a new wave of Central Americans migrating from California and Mexico (Rodriguez 1993). These barrios will maintain their historic position as one of the three major Chicana/o areas in Texas. The Westside barrio in San Antonio is one of the two most historic Chicana/o urban zones in the Southwest. This barrio functioned as an important entry zone for immigrant labor and Tejanas/os migrating into the central part of the state (Acosta and Winegarten 2003) and, by 1920, it was the city with the largest Chicana/o populace in the nation (Arreola 2002). Economic expansion, including a significant military industry, has maintained San Antonio’s position as a major regional center. The Westside barrio (along

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with a large Chicana/o urban zone in the Southside) experienced significant in-migration from Mexico, as well as other regions of Texas and the Southwest, and, by the 1950s, the available housing stock was unable to meet the demand. The conditions in the Westside barrio mirrored the declining state of a majority of barrios during that period. Since strict segregation governed social relations and political policy in the South (Branch 1988), the Westside and Southside were the “sole options” for Chicana/o relocation into San Antonio. Nevertheless, due mainly to an acute housing deficiency, the Westside barrio expanded rapidly into adjacent neighborhoods. This zone has since expanded into one of the largest Chicana/o cities in the entire region. By 1980, Chicanas/os constituted almost 60 percent of San Antonio’s populace (Sanchez 1993). The Westside continued its historic trajectory into previously segregated areas, incorporating them into barrio urban space. It is currently the second largest barrio in the Southwest. Santa Ana, CA, located in the middle of Orange County, is a prime example of late modern barrio urban transformation. Orange County, between 1900 and 1970, was one of the most conservative, reactionary Euro-American areas in the Southwest (Kling et al. 1991). Chicanas/os were relegated to second-tier status within what was a strictly enforced colonial economy (Barrera 1979). The community resided in small agricultural encampments or segregated barrios, of which Santa Ana was the largest in the county. Through 1970, Chicanas/os remained a distinct minority in regard to their political, social, and economic status. However, since that period, Chicana/o migration patterns have been the major source of population growth in the city (Haas 1991). This populace increased over 100 percent by 1986, constituting 62 percent of the city at that time (Haas 1991, 257). The city’s older housing stock offered rents and housing prices that were significantly lower than the land values and housing prices that characterized Orange County real estate throughout the post-World War II suburban expansion. Community leaders joined an anti-redevelopment alliance during the 1970s to force the city to address affordable housing and Latina/o business interests (Haas 1991). The migration patterns continued to accelerate over the next fifteen years. The 2000 census indicated that Santa Ana housed a higher percentage of Chicanas/os than any other urban zone in California. Despite being located in one of the most conservative suburban countys in the state, Santa Ana became a major Chicana/o city, both economically and socially. The city’s commercial districts are overwhelmingly oriented toward Spanish-language consumers and, in terms of the political arena, Chicanas/os have substantially increased their level of representation. These three barrios are prescriptive of the demographic and spatial restructuring that characterizes Chicana/o urbanism in the Southwest. Though initially spatially constrained by structural, racist public and private policies that included redlining, segregation, restrictive housing covenants, racism in the real estate industry, the lack of public infrastructure, political repression, police harassment, economic exploitation, and an apartheid logic of uneven development, these Chicana/o urban zones have transcended the history of other barrios in the Southwest by “capturing new urban spaces” and evolving into internally, culturally controlled areas. The regional evolution of the cities of the Southwest reflect a three-tiered urbanization pattern that is exemplified by Los Angeles. The first period was the initial settlement in racially defined space (the original logic of urban barrios). In conjunction, these areas also saw the development of smaller barrios and colonias interspersed throughout the

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region. These barrios were established to accommodate for overcrowded housing conditions, limited spatial capacity, and/or labor demands in the agriculture, railroad, and manufacturing industries. The second era was the expansion of the geography of traditional barrios due to immigration and population increases that superseded the housing capacity of historic barrios. The third phase, occurring mainly in the past twenty years, has been the middle-class migration into suburban areas and the dispersal of lowerincome barrios into different sectors of the city. This most recent phase has had no direct impact on the historic barrios since it involves a relatively new period of population expansion and the out-migration of the original barrio households. The next two decades will exhibit a continuation of these trends. Numerous cities have also experienced this tiered residential patterning, indicating a significant increase in the overall percentage of Chicana/o suburban households (Valle and Torres 2000; Suro and Singer 2002). The barrio-suburb dichotomy is an inherently conflictive relationship within urban policy. Class considerations dictate a distinct set of social demands. To illustrate, the quality of schools, social amenities, housing options, and consumption choices are all specific issues among middle-class Chicanas/os. Changing conditions related to economic opportunity have provided segments of the urban populace with alternatives and opportunities that did not exist prior to the 1970s. In particular, housing discrimination, de facto and de jure, constricted urbanization patterns through the late 1960s. Although discrimination remains a factor in suburban markets, reforms have attempted to reverse this legacy (Meyer 2000). Suburbanization has translated into a loss of consumer spending power within the barrio economy. The fraying of linkages between the working and managerial classes has complicated urban policy considerations since there is no longer one massive urban barrio to which primary attention to a metapolicy universe can be directed. Planning for the new Chicana/o majority, however, will remain focused on the declining built environment of the barrio. The crisis in housing remains a Chicana/o urban issue in the Southwest. Environmental pollution and land use conflicts increasingly place barrios at risk in relation to public health. Economic revitalization, job generation, and small business stability are also problems in most urban barrios. The systemic denial of capital reinvestment in urban zones “led to the steady devaluation of entire areas of the inner city, whether obsolete port, commercial and warehousing land uses or residential neighborhoods. At some point, the devaluation of capital depresses the ground-rent level…which was underdeveloped with the suburbanization of capital…” (Smith 1984, 150). Thus, uneven development has left barrios in a permanent state of deterioration, social dysfunction, limited economic opportunity, and political marginalization. Additionally, in order to ensure active minority participation in land use policy, planning must now confront the need for bilingual and bicultural practices. This move toward advocacy planning is partially a response to the ascension of Chicanas/os into political power. The response of planning to demographic transformation, political empowerment, and social demands emanating from urban barrios has been to restructure the rational functional model. In particular, demands for bilingualism (in some cities three to five languages) and inclusion of marginalized communities have forced the profession to increase the level of public information and discourse on urban policy and practice. Exclusionary practices including censorship of information, provision of inadequate

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documents, sequestering of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) regulations, inattention to environmental issues, and blatant racism have gradually ended. Barrio residents have begun to demand from planning a consideration normatively associated with suburbia: quality of life for lower income residents (Pena 1998; Torres and Katsiaficas 1999; Davis 2000). Open space, improved infrastructure, quality housing, revitalized commercial zones, and industrial redevelopment are components of stable neighborhoods (Pastor et al. 2000). Barrio residents are no different in regard to their demands on the planning profession. What is different from the past is that cities in the Southwest now have Chicana/o political leaders who can forcefully advocate this agenda.

The Chicana/o City of the West, East Los Angeles 1950–2000 East L.A. is a barrio and, in reality, a city created in its own cultural image. There is no other barrio that compares in geography, history, symbolic influence, and/or urban form. Some barrios have succeeded in the political arena (for example, San Francisco), others have experienced economic rebirth (San Antonio; Denver; Pico Rivera, CA), and most have expanded (Denver, Albuquerque, Phoenix, Sacramento, Houston, San Jose, DallasFort Worth). However, the history of this particular barrio remains a unique and important urban legacy for the Southwest. Its unparalleled Chicana/o urban geography, its history of racism in urban policy, barrio expansion, middle-class flight, and sociocultural constitution all give the greater Eastside of L.A. an important role in the social history of land use and planning. The growth of East L.A. occurred within a distinct cultural framework. Land and economic power were held by Euro-Americans but, socially and culturally, the evolution of the Eastside was controlled by the actual users of the space. Everyday culture, or the people who determined culture and daily patterns, re-created spatial relations in their own vision (Lefebvre 1991a). This cultural and demographic type of transformation supersedes the ecological paradigm of planning theory. In essence, the Chicano city reflects Lefebvre’s conceptualization that “space is political and ideological. It is a historical product…it has always been political and strategic…” (1976, 31–2). The transition from a multi-ethnic community into a predominantly Chicana/o barrio (between 1940 and 1960) was significant within the demographic and urban history of the region (Romo 1983; Sanchez 1993; Acuna 1984). This transition was not initially comprehended as the beginning of a transformation into a major conurbanizing region. Chicanas/os restructured the character of economic, social, and cultural relations in the region, making East L.A. synonymous with a specific cultural identity. Daily life and constant in-migration of Latinas/os produced a cultural enclave that experienced constant expansion. In contrast to Los Angeles’ residential apartheid, East L.A. was an urban system dominated by Chicanas/os. The trajectory of this change continues into the current era. The greater Eastside (Valle and Torres 2000), north, east, and south, has evolved into a vast Latina/o urban ring surrounding the civic center. Barrio culture produced and reproduced spatial relations in its internally driven vision of socio-political relations (Lefebvre 1991b). Central Los Angeles is now dominated by barrios in all directions. Chicanas/os and Mexicanas/os compose the majority population in a number of areas of South Central

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L.A., and the community west of the civic center is the largest multi-ethnic Latina/o area in the country. Central Americans, Mexicanas/os, South Americans, and Chicanas/os interact in a zone with the highest population densities of these groups in the Southwest. They also compose the largest ethnic group in the oldest suburbs of the city. These areas, although distinct in history and location, have essentially merged with East L.A., forming a new urban pattern of cultural and social Latina/o urban hegemony. From this center, Chicana/o urbanism now links inner-city barrios with suburbia. Visitors to the region can travel over twenty miles, passing through one barrio after another into the central San Gabriel Valley. Traversing south, one would find that a number of small cities in the county have developed into Latina/o working-class suburbs. Suburban movement has also impacted central and northern Orange County, which, historically, has had a predominantly Euro-American population (Santa Ana is a prime example of the influx of Latinas/os throughout Southern California). The greater Eastside has emerged during the past twenty years, along with these other adjacent subregions, into a mini-megapolis of Latina/o regionalism. This is a history, in reality an agency of culture, in which the primary users of space have reconstructed economic, political, and social relations (Lefebvre 1991a, 1991b, 1969). Central Los Angeles county is, in effect, a massive Latina/o urban geography. While grander in scale and influence, the urban policy challenges of this region impact virtually all other barrios in the country. The cities of the Southwest are in the midst of similar dynamic Chicana/o urbanism. What is different about East L.A. is the geographic expansion of the barrio into a regional conurbanization. Second- and third-generation residents have migrated into what has effectively become a systemic relationship of working-class Chicana/o suburbs ringing the Los Angeles civic center. In reality, barrios in Southern California exhibit the theoretical urban form of polynucleated regions pioneered by Gottdiener (1985). In this region, suburban and urban and social and land use policy merge. It is a misnomer to label the situation in this region urban crisis, since social and policy considerations are not centered in clearly defined inner-city areas. Urban policy deals, in reality, with a regional crisis in which problems related to affordable housing supply, declining economic districts, street gangs, social crises, educational policy, public health, environmental degradation, and uneven development envelop the totality of Southern California. The blurring of suburban and urban concerns has been amplified by Chicana/o population growth (Mendez 2003). This demographic expansion is directly correlated to global economic restructuring (Sassen 1991) and the elite consumption classes’ demands for very low-wage labor over the past thirty years. Urban crises influence policy throughout a range of jurisdictions subsumed within the boundaries of the greater Eastside. In addition, the demographic expansion of Chicanas/os in Los Angeles county has created a number of independent barrios completely isolated from East L.A. but exhibiting similar urban policy challenges. This dispersal of the community in Los Angeles county and, further, into three other counties has reshaped its cultural and spatial landscape. Within this dynamic framework of ethnic transformation, Latinas/os now compete internally (on a regional basis) for limited resources to address what is, in reality, a metropolitan urban crisis.

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Chicana/o Urban Trends in the Southwest Cities throughout the Southwest have also experienced significant urban and demographic changes. In fact, immigration and natural population growth have impacted every major metropolitan area. Spatial limitations of traditional barrios, often determined by racist housing restrictions, hindered the social transformation of these cities. However, combined with middle-class suburban flight from barrios and a constant flow of workingclass immigrants, regional demographics and urbanizing patterns are now strongly influenced by new residential demands. At the same time that Chicanas/os began moving into suburbs, regional barrios also continued to expand. This demographic change created new minority working-class suburbs, ushering a cultural change in suburbia. Phoenix, Denver, Albuquerque, San Antonio, and the Dallas-Fort Worth area are examples of how demographic transformations that have occurred since 1970 have impacted urban form and social relations in the Southwest. San Jose and Sacramento also experienced similar changes in socio-spatial relations. These cities are characterized by low density sprawl, constant real estate demands to convert rural land into massive subdivisions, a dual wage economy, and expansion of Chicana/o barrios due mainly to the constant demand for low-wage immigrant labor. The growth rates follow a pattern established in the late 1960s, a time when the expansion of the Southwest occurred at a substantially higher rate than in other regions (Saenz and Greenless 1996). The recent census indicates that this trend will continue well into the 2020s (Suro and Singer 2002). A contradictory aspect of this urbanization is that, while population increases and expansion of barrio urban boundaries have translated into increased spending power, commercial districts within these communities have continued to stagnate. The flow of consumer consumption patterns into suburban commercial districts and malls has negatively impacted the small business character of the barrio economy. Small businesses are unable to compete with the high-volume, low-pricing strategy of corporate retailers. Barrio businesses have historically had difficulty in gaining support for redevelopment funding in their districts. They are also underfunded in relation to infrastructure such as streets, alleys, and parking. Barrio commercial districts have experienced limited change in the type and scale of business formation and are forced to compete with major corporations in the food service and retail industries. Phoenix is a prime example of these divergent trends. The historic barrio south of the civic center expanded west in response to increased migration into the Sunbelt, rapid sprawl, and the demand for low-wage labor. Lower-income barrios developed in the south and southwest sectors of the city, while working-class Chicano suburbs developed southeast and northeast of the civic center. Eventually the southeast barrios linked with the suburb of Mesa to create a new, major Chicana/o urban zone. Middle-class Chicanas/os have transitioned from barrios into suburban areas, mainly in the developing western sector of the city. This migration into suburban areas is one of the most significant demographic changes in this region. The composition of numerous suburban areas has changed over the course of the past two decades, shifting from predominantly Euro-American to multi-ethnic neighborhoods. Chicana/o population increases will continue to restructure the demographics of both older and developing suburbs. Two areas in the city that will evolve into major Chicano urban suburban zones are Glendale and Peoria.

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Major Chicana/o barrios ring Denver’s civic center. The two largest barrios are Westside and Northside. The Chicana/o populace of these barrios has expanded on a north-south axis over the past two decades. Concurrently, suburban migration has occurred in the southwest and northern zones of the metropolitan area. This historic barrio has experienced a slight decline in population over time due to loss of housing stock, regional migration patterns, gentrification, and changing land use patterns. The most significant change is the growth of Chicana/o populations in the working- and middle-class suburbs of Denver. Chicanas/os have dispersed into most zones surrounding the city, particularly North Glen, Thorton, and Westminister, northwest from the civic center. The major barrios have maintained their role as an entry point for immigrant workers and an area of affordable housing for lower-income households. The Tejano populace in both San Antonio and El Paso have maintained an historical and significant influence over urban form and social relations within Southwestern urbanism. These cities emerged as the major economic centers linking the border and Rio Grande Valle with other areas of Texas. In spite of a history of brutal political and economic repression in the region (Acuna 1972), these cities were the center of Chicana/o urbanism for the first twenty-five years of the past century. They had the largest Chicana/o populace and retained the highest percentage of Chicanas/os compared to other major cities during the twentieth century. The urban impact of this demographic reality has been a century of constant expansion of barrio spatial control. Due to urban economic demands for low-wage labor, a tight housing market forced the gradual desegregation of neighborhoods adjacent to major barrios such as Westside and Southside in San Antonio (Rosales 2000), and Segundo Barrio, the Eastside and Lower Valley in El Paso (Marquez 1985). After World War II, with political pressure to end Jim Crow and, in particular, the abysmal minority educational systems (Foley 1990), Chicanas/os addressed the acute lack of housing opportunity. This was particularly an issue in the San Antonio and El Paso barrios. Structurally, segregation could not sustain itself in these Texas cities. An out-migration into adjacent neighborhoods, mainly old early-century working-class suburbs, and other sectors of the city ushered in the initial stages of cultural transformation in formerly exclusionary residential zones. By the 1960s and, especially, the 1970s, the Chicana/o populace began an historic outmigration into a few working-class suburbs. This was the first significant era of housing opportunity. The migration was a direct response to the two key factors of population increases and constant labor demands by the regional economy. In both cities, this first wave of migration from barrios was oriented to northern sectors of each city. Lower income housing remained concentrated in the traditional barrios, but these barrios also experienced geographic growth and increased residential density. This urban evolution impacted El Paso’s El Segunda barrio to a high degree due to the fact that it had more available space than the Rio Bravo on the south and the civic center to the north. In the current period, both cities have maintained a significantly large Chicana/o populace in relation to the other major cities of the Southwest. San Antonio retains its position with the highest percentage of all major cities in the region. El Paso, along with the South Valle and Tijuana, are critical entry ports for the immigrant labor treasured by all sectors of the Southwest economy. Both cities continue to rely on transborder commerce as an important component of their local economies. These are the only two

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cities in the Southwest that have maintained an essential role in the formulation of Chicana/o urbanism over the course of the entire twentieth century.

Impact of Chicanas/os on Urban Policy and Spatial Relations Demographic transitions have had a significant impact on regional spatial relations, urban revitalization strategies, and social policy. Cities in the Southwest have expanded far beyond their historic centers in a decentralized pattern of urban development (James et al. 1984). These cities also exhibit different class sectors. Since the Civil Rights era, a managerial class of Chicanas/os has been “allowed entrance” into middle class-oriented suburban enclaves. This flight from the barrio has shifted the focus of public policy from inner-city barrios to include considerations of quality of life issues traditionally associated with newly urbanizing zones. Conversely, barrio residents have become increasingly active in the political area in regard to environmental pollution, noncompatible land use proposals, and quality of life issues. These cities are also experiencing a transition in political leadership. Chicanas/os have increased their level of electoral participation since the mid-1980s (de la Garza et al. 1994). A number of cities that had no Chicana/o representatives in city government prior to the 1980s, now have significant factions on city councils. A few even have Chicana/o mayors and, in limited instances, Chicanas/os hold majority status on city councils. This trend toward empowerment is transforming political relations throughout the Southwest (de la Garza et al. 1994). In many cities, Chicana/o elected officials have maneuvered themselves into key committees that govern urban redevelopment and housing programs. Historically, this is the first instance in which they have had a direct role in the determination of urban policy that addresses barrio crises. This political power, however, is not predominant. They continue to be confronted with the reality that funds are allocated to other areas, and not solely within barrios. Chicanas/os have also increased their participation in city bureaucracies (Villarreal and Mapula 1991), including planning, redevelopment, and administration. This constitutes a new era of access and influence in the policy arena. This change does not, however, imply that attention to the demands of barrio residents are the sole purview of minority-elected officials. The new suburban reality, in which Chicanas/os are a significant component, signifies the reality of differing urban experiences and demands. The quality of life considerations of suburbanites are markedly different from those of barrio residents (Calderon 1996; Horton 1995; Saito 1998). In responding to different class sectors, officials now have to develop differing approaches to public policy. On one level, middle-class interests have maintained political support for revitalization focused on barrio spatial relations, housing, and economic development. They have led the effort to transfer knowledge and power to activists representing lowerincome areas. This linkage of professional classes with working-class barrios is an important stage in equalizing comprehension of HUD regulations and demanding enforcement of federal urban redevelopment mandates. The growth of the managerial class is one of the most significant changes impacting urbanization patterns. Initially, suburban migration was directed into older barrios located adjacent to urban civic centers or small towns near major cities with agricultural

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economies and a demand for low-wage labor. Housing discrimination and home loan restrictions prohibited Chicanas/os from migrating into suburban areas in the early postWorld War II era. Barrios were tightly defined social, cultural, and economic zones that reflected this system of residential apartheid. Urban policy was relatively straightforward, and all programs related to the community were centered in urban barrios. By the early 1980s, Chicanas/os increasingly began to migrate into what were traditionally labeled “lily white” suburban communities (Meyer 2000). Economic opportunity in suburbs, enforcement of employment discrimination laws, and deterioration of barrios all contributed to a momentum for change in residential spatial and cultural relations. Chicanas/os rapidly became the new suburbanites. While not always relocating to middle- or upper-class areas, these residents transformed the socio-cultural character of suburban areas ringing civic centers. This demographic change was indicative of the increasing Latina/o spending power in the regional economy (Davila 2001), and the influx into suburbia fostered a change in consumer patterns at regional malls and major department stores. Given the limited opportunites for consumption in the small business configuration of the barrio economy, working-class barrio residents began to patronize suburban businesses. The evolution of multi-ethnic suburban zones gradually reduced resistance to the presence of minority consumers in these districts. The presence of these newer suburbanites also changed local perceptions about culture, leading to shifts in regional consumption patterns. No longer constrained to the confines of the barrio, the managerial class began establishing businesses in the regional economy. Although minorities do not have the same rate of business creation exhibited by greater suburban locations (Light and Gold 2000; Wainwright 2000), they have become integral to the local and regional Southwestern economy. A vast majority of Latina/o enterprises are small and mid-size retail and manufacturing companies. They sought suburban locations for their higher expendable incomes, strong competition, social acceptance of Chicana/o home owners, and potential for future expansion. The bicultural nature of Latina/o businesses also provides opportunities to address dual markets, either through bilingual services or products that have strong crossover potential in the marketplace (Hamilton and Chinchilla 2001). Two industries that are indicative of the changing nature of the consumer economy are food and entertainment (Davila 2001). Both industries have enjoyed a high volume of sales and opportunites for expansion in suburbs, while remaining anchored to barrio traditions. Chicana/o entrepreneurs have also entered into nontraditional industries and economic sectors including professional services, media, construction, and manufacturing. Population increases will continue to impact suburban patterns for the next twenty years. Conversely, traditional barrios do not address the managerial classes’ housing demands, and, given their limited spatial capacity, cannot be expected to address issues related to this projected growth. Working-class suburbs and barrios remain mired in a supply crisis of affordable housing. In relation to urbanization patterns, Chicanas/os are assuming a major role as housing consumers in outer ring zones (Suro and Singer 2002; Myers 1999). This trend has already commenced, with Chicana/o residential preferences indicating a movement out of denser urban areas and into suburbs. Los Angeles, Phoenix, Dallas-Fort Worth, San Jose, Houston, San Antonio, Sacramento, and Denver are cities that exemplify this trend in which developing suburban zones are experiencing an influx

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of Chicana/o home owners (Frey and O’Hare 1993). Due to the trends of Chicana/o urbanism that emerged in the 1980s, the suburbs that were developed during the second wave of urban expansion in the 1960s and 1970s have significantly changed their sociodemographic character. Southwestern suburban rings are transitioning into Chicana/o majority suburbs and experiencing another historical sociological trend: Euro-American flight into rural areas. These urbanization trends in the Southwest and West will continue. California is projected to increase its population by approximately 40 percent, and other states are experiencing substantial population increases that have historically translated into constant development and sprawl. This growth is inherently influenced by Latina/o housing demands, which are occurring throughout the United States. Within a bifurcated class location, Latinas/os will express the ususal quality of life concerns relating to traffic congestion, adequate open space, quality schools, and available amenities. Another factor is the involvement in suburban growth control movements, in which NIMBYISM (“not in my backyard”) will remain a prevailing political factor in regard to local and regional land use policy. The managerial class currently expresses these conventional class considerations in relation to planning and development. This critical subject of class division is likely to surface with regard to the regional conflict between sprawl and decentralization and density and affordability. It is inevitable that the growing class divide in public policy will become apparent. If these dual trends continue, numerous metropolitan regions will become majority Chicana/o, while sprawl will result in an outer ring of distant, small suburbs dominated by Euro-Americans. This “new formulation of white flight” that started in the 1950s and 1960s is now placing the pressures of traffic congestion, middle-class gentrification, rapidly rising property values, and overcrowded schools on previously sheltered rural communities. These communities are becoming critical of this urban migration and the corresponding negative impact on their infrastructure and rural culture. In relation to Chicana/o urbanism, barrios will continue to suffer from the affordable housing crisis while the managerial class will assume a major influence on suburban growth in the Southwest. This changing pattern of urbanization has created a policy linkage between barrios and working-class suburbs. Since barrios are grossly overcrowded, out-migration into lower income suburbs has characterized urbanizing patterns of the working class. These suburbs exhibit the conventional spatial pattern of very low-density areas located adjacent to local commercial districts and a reliance on freeways for consumption and employment. They have social and educational concerns similar to those found in barrios. Suburban gangs, drug sales, and crime have also matriculated into suburbs from the inner city. Numerous suburban gangs have affiliations with traditional barrio gangs (Vigil 2002). These linkages are based on migration patterns, the prison system, and/or the regional drug market. In essence, the inner city has migrated to the suburbs. By the 1990s a range of urban problems had negatively impacted working-class suburbs. The housing stock exhibited signs of deterioration and increased incidence of absentee landlords. The percentage of rental units in major cities also increased. Infrastructure remains underfunded and poorly maintained, park and recreational opportunities reduced, and local labor markets have failed to address demand for entrylevel positions. In some cities, older working-class suburbs merged with traditional

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barrios creating a consolidated Chicana/o conurbanized zone. Thus, planning and land use policy issues impacting barrios have evolved into a regional crisis related to underdevelopment, failed revitalization strategies, and lack of attention to the supply of affordable housing. Limited housing options, in particular older, overcrowded, deteriorating rental units, were a major factor related to this expansion from traditional barrios. Working-class suburbs with lower-cost housing serve as a social release to this crisis. A key problem for planners, the urban policy cartel, and Chicana/o officeholders is how to comprehensively address urban crises within the context of different political jurisdictions that are negatively impacted by similar market and social forces. The policy crisis is related to the fragmented structure of regional government (Fogelson 1967). Comprehensively addressing the crises of barrios is difficult at best since independent cities, county government, and special districts need to coordinate strategy—a level of cooperation that has not materialized. Jurisdictions normatively resist working together; in fact they are generally in direct economic competition with each other. In metropolitan areas, policy gridlock results in a kaleidoscope of programs, policies, strategies, and visions to revitalize barrios. The rationale linking these approaches is nonexistent. In this arena of policy myopia, demands to improve the condition of barrios are relegated to the nuanced opinions of locally elected officials and city staff. Regional solutions have not effectively consolidated HUD and state programs into coordinated strategies to limit the influence of innumerable small jurisdictions.

Planning for the New Majority Planning in this transformed political and cultural arena has two challenges: addressing a substantially expanded zone of uneven development within a history of economic decline and responding to minority ethnic political majorities demanding solutions. Neither challenge is unique to planning; however, the scale of urban barrios has become a significant influence on spatial relations throughout the Southwest. Now that barrios have expanded exponentially, planning can no longer define barrio spatial interests as being located in a clearly situated historic space. Changes in the political arena will accelerate demands for bilingual and bicultural approaches in the planning practice. In some regions, the demand is for multi-lingual and multi-cultural participatory planning strategies and inclusive political coalitions (Davis 2000; De Genova and Ramos-Zayas 2003). The previous era in which “English Only” was a satisfactory approach to the transfer of knowledge has become a rejected relic of rational-functionalism. Unfortunately, planning in some cities has yet to comprehend practical methods that link planning to multi-ethnic constituencies (Davis 2000; De Genova and Ramos-Zayas 2003). Newly energized Chicana/o voting blocs will increase pressure on cities to actively engage barrio residents in the urban revitalization process. This shift in practice, standing in opposition to an exclusionary, elitist model of planning related to changing political relations, is an optimistic vision that has yet to achieve a universalized status in this society. The potential influence of barrio residents on planning is a promising dimension to demographic change. In reality, the advocacy planning platform, staunchly ridiculed in

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the 1960s and 1970s by a majority in the profession, constituted a proactive solution toward a progressive approach to planning for the multi-ethnic city. The fundamental factors of the urban barrio crises have not dramatically changed since the War on Poverty was adopted. Affordable housing, economic revitalization, open space, infrastructure, and public transportation remain seemingly interminable crises. Minority communities in the United States are, quite possibly, the most researched subject groups in world history. Starting with the Settlement House movement’s early investigations of the tenements, lower-income minority neighborhoods have served as the focus of an endless stream of analysis. However, the analysis and the allocation of funds to address urban crises discovered through the analysis are and have been controlled by a Euro-American policy elite. The urban policy cartel, which in an earlier era reflected the all-American racism prevalent in this society, has one reoccurring “outcome” in relation to this “expertise production”—that these crises have never been resolved. Consequently, planning elites remain adamant in their desire to maintain their position as speakers for barrio residents. Thus, planning has difficulty in decoupling itself from a staid normative planning tradition despite the strident critiques of the 1960s (Parenti 1978; Piven and Cloward 1972). Does planning have the will to change? Will Chicanas/os ever directly influence resolutions to address the crisis of uneven development? Will cities ever transfer redevelopment funds into barrios? Will planning’s sacred cow, the almighty civic center, live on forever at the expense of barrio revitalization? How will emerging political majorities force the profession to admit failure and reform itself? With their move into prominent political leadership roles, Chicana/o officials have forged a position at the center of urban policy. However, simply entering arenas of power is not sufficient for adequate comprehension of complicated issues, programs, and policies related to planning. These officials need to develop a historical understanding of urban policy and its negative socio-cultural evolution in relation to barrios. What these office holders can offer that their predecessors could not is direct experience with the housing crisis and failed redevelopment programs. They are knowledgable about the abuses of eminent domain, neighborhood destruction, and the lack of open space. This new generation of elected officials will correlate the social demands of barrio residents to these urban social policy questions. The reality of local politics, situated in an arena historically dominated by the real estate and development industries (Harvey 1973; Tabb and Sawers 1984; Rodriguez 1993; Peterson 1981; Feagin 1998), is related to political campaign fund raising. Chicanas/os are not immune to the systemic relationship between campaign financing and political influence. Possessing a different vision will not necessarily result in substantive changes in public policy (Calderon 1996; Horton 1995; Saito 1998). This new group’s level of independence from the planning bureaucracies of political leaders has yet to be determined. In this changing arena of power relations, the planning function will be required to be inclusive in both substance and symbolism. Whether this indicates a qualitative transformation from the stifling rational-functional model or a move toward a simple and practical response to change will determine how planning will actually respond to the future. In planning for the emerging new majority, another level of power relations is also becoming influential in land use policy—that of state legislatures (Quinones 1990, 169).

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One factor is the increased Chicana/o representation and a second is the fact that regional governance has proven inadequate in addressing urban crises. State-level solutions, whether in the form of programs, regulations, or funding, are entering into the debate over urban development, revitalization, and environmental protection (Hopkins 2001, 103). How regions address population growth in relation to housing and open space is an issue in which state authority may be the sole avenue to crafting regional strategies. Enterprise Zones, environmental protection, and general plan powers are centered in state regulatory authority. Enforcement powers are major catalysts forcing cities to adhere to the changing political landscape and indicate that urban and land use policy is entering a period of transformation. The legacy of the advocate planning movement is the most apparent arena of change within the planning practice. Multi-lingualism is a mandated component of public hearings, documents, and planning information. Culture, art, and social custom have also been incorporated to increase civic participation in barrios. The demand for full access to information and the function of local, state, and federal programs are being incorporated into basic planning practice. In this respect, the discourse on the future of barrio spatial relations will increasingly be controlled by the users of space. This political transformation is forcing reforms on planning practice and ending past practices that openly discouraged community participation by barrio residents. However, these institutional changes have not altered the fact that social movements remain necessary. For example, in El Monte, one of Los Angeles’ earliest working-class suburbs, community activists have launched a social movement against the use of eminent domain to expand the auto mall district. Change occurs slowly, even in cities with emerging Chicana/o political majorities.

Chicanas/os and the New Southwest The cultural diversity that is restructuring social relations throughout the Southwest is a signal of maturity in civic society. The movement of Chicanas/os into predominately Euro-American neighborhoods, an issue that caused tension, fear, and flight in previous decades, is seldom a major concern now. Suburban migration patterns have included a significant percentage of Latinas/os since the mid-1980s. However, Latinas/os continue to confront socio-economic barriers to moving into elite suburbs with the highest regional (and national) household incomes. The integration of suburbia and constant sprawl are two patterns that will continue to characterize the cities of the Southwest for the next two decades. Design and architectural form have also been influenced by culture. Southwest architecture is associated with styles developed by Pueblo nations and copied by Spanish settlers (Moore and Moore 1995). This style is the mandated design motif in a few cities, most notably Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Santa Barbara, California. It has also enhanced street facades and government buildings. In Southern California, Mission-style architecture is prominent in private homes and civic buildings (Banham 1971). This retro-design, pioneering in relation to local design regulations of earlier eras, is responsible for the quaint urban imagery associated with a number of cities. Commercial districts, historic zones, and selected residential tracts have been designed according to

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this vernacular architectural movement throughout the Southwest. “Santa Fe style” has become inclusive of this urban form that is being preserved and re-created in cities seeking to redefine their history. It remains prominent in the development of private homes and civic buildings. In the Southwest, sprawl has a cultural context that intersects urban and social policy. The spirit of the barrio is being transferred into suburbia via cultural events that commemorate important historical and social experiences linking barrios to Mexican culture. These historical and social influences, having become universalized within regional culture, have forced significant changes in recreational and social policy throughout the Southwest. Three events, Diez y Seis de Septiembe, Cinco de Mayo, y Dia de los Muertos, are major celebrations within Mexicana/o culture and form an essential component of barrio culture (Arreola 2002; Tatum 2001). These fiestas have also found new audiences within Euro-American cultures. Cities throughout the Southwest allocate resources for cultural programming and retain Chicana/o artists as consultants for these festivities. Thanks to the Chicano Mural movement of the 1960s, cities now fund murals, adopt ordinances to protect and restore original public art, and sponsor mural projects aimed at area youth (Dunitz 1997). When suburbanites visit barrios to participate in these fiestas, the social logic associated with inner-city barrios (gangs, crime, and social dysfunction) is bridged and the multi-ethnic city is linked, if only briefly, through the performance of traditional cultural events. Ballet folklorico, food, art, crafts, urban design, and music are all examples of cultural forms that transcend the confines of barrios and link suburbs to Chicana/o culture. When hosting these events, historic urban centers are inundated with tens of thousands of visitors, guest artists, and performers (Arreola 2002). The Tejano Music Festival in San Antonio is a major regional cultural event that brings music aficionados to the city for a week of performances and programs. Los Angeles’ Fiesta on Broadway is a music-oriented two-day event that draws over 300,000 annually. These events attract Latinas/os from the inner city, working-class suburbs, and outlying counties and also Mexicano y Tejano music aficionados. Similar events are conducted in all urban centers in the region. In Southern California this intermingling of important historical and cultural holidays and celebrations now includes the Guatemalan, El Salvadorean, and Nicaraguan communities (Hamilton and Chinchilla 2001). These communities have organized civic events acknowledging their cultural history and the significant urban communities that have evolved in this city during the past two decades. This shared cultural experience, however, masks inherent conflicts related to urban policy. The evolution of Chicana/o suburbia, working- and middle-class, has also resulted in conflicting social policy demands. Factions of the community favor growth control as a quality of life issue. This platform, which opposes increased density, complicates the demand for an adequate supply of affordable housing within these regions. It also highlights cultural clashes that have existed between immigrant and lower-income barrio residents and suburbanites since the 1920s (Marquez 1993). Among these factions there is a social debate over which class is more environmentally conscious: the inner-city sector that lives in dense housing configurations, utilizes public transportation, and actively recycles, or the class that joins environmental organizations, uses city recycling containers, and votes for environmentally-oriented candidates.

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The new managerial class will increasingly be linked with NIMBYISM on issues related to growth and density. On one level, the maturation of this community mirrors social changes long associated with suburban migration and socialization. Thus, while social acculturation remains embedded with barrio celebrations, political acculturation is assuming a distinct class difference in relation to urban policy. The increasing political bifurcation of the community is increasingly based on class—a condition that creates real and potential schisms in the debate over urban and land use policies. Spatial relations in the context of Chicana/o conurbanization demand attention to the need to substantially increase the supply of affordable housing, parks, and economic opportunity. However, this does not imply the likelihood of strong consensus within differing class sectors. The policy challenges of the new cities of the Southwest pose a complex set of political and social questions that is only now being confronted in the initial era of direct political empowerment.

13 Political Coalitions, Chicanas/os, and the Question of Urban Policy The social transformation of urban patterns, the densification of barrios, and the evolution of multiethnic suburbs have inherent political implications for planning policy. The constituency of metropolitan regions in the Southwest has changed dramatically within a generation: class interests have become increasingly polarized and the political arena is being reconstructed through the ascendance of Latina/o officeholders. While political access alone is insufficient to address the myriad urban problems, increased political representation will complicate demands regarding revitalization and redistribution strategy. Institutionalized barriers to the electoral arena in the Southwest have, historically, included poll taxes, the White Man’s Union in Texas, and gerry-mandering (Pachon 1985, 249). These racist restrictions on political participation existed through the 1960s and 1970s. Barrios, historically ignored zones of deterioration and underdevelopment, are now represented by people whose life experiences are centered in these communities. This direct relationship is forging a new sense of urgency for reform and benefits from redevelopment. Chicana/o elected officials, however, remain marginalized in relation to actual political power (de la Garza et al. 1994; Quinones 1990). Among the major cities in the region, only San Antonio currently has a Chicana/o majority on the city council. Coalitions must remain the core conduit for changing the way that revitalization resources are allocated to barrios. This phase of political history will continue until majority control is achieved within local and county government. In an arena of systemic unequal representation, what must be achieved is a transition from marginalized social movements into marginalized political power. The main difference will be direct political representation, albeit in a minority status. Empowerment is here qualified as control over the urban policy apparatus of local government. San Francisco is a prime example of a city in which coalitions and barrio policy effectively address urban issues. The city’s Mission District has successfully advocated for the housing, social service, and urban development demands of this area since the early 1970s (Castells 1983). In an era during which Latinas/os were excluded from political representation in local politics (Acuna 1972; Burke 2002; Cayo-Sexton 1965), the Mission’s leaders effectively lobbied the board of supervisors (San Francisco is a city/county), achieving a series of victories against the densification of commercial zones advocated by powerful real estate lobbies. The community also won numerous local concessions related to economic development, employment programs, public art, and social welfare. At the time, this was the vision for future empowerment, a future that is only now materializing in the Southwest. Unfortunately, the racism that bars political empowerment for Chicanas/os has not been completely resolved. Although significant demographic, cultural and political

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change has occurred since the 1970s, sectors of Euro-American society remain adamantly opposed to having Chicanas/os in political office (Browning et al. 2003). This legacy dates from the 1950s, when a powerful political elite told Raymond Telles, “No Mexican will ever be mayor of El Paso” (Garcia 1998, 53). The 2001 Los Angeles mayoral race was another prime example of this historical and divisive social crisis. Conservative voters in the West San Fernando Valley frequently indicated doubts that an “ethnic candidate,” Antonio Villaraigosa, possessed the capability to govern the city. These sentiments crystallized when a significant percentage of conservative voters supported a Euro-American civil rights liberal over a Chicano civil rights advocate. These voters were unwilling to move beyond ethnicity as a determinating factor in the voting booth. The key problem in relation to urban policy is the persistent socio-class divide between barrio residents and city officials. Power relations remain skewed toward a Eurocentric vision of society, one in which marginalized communities are situated in a geography of exclusion. “Today…the guardians of sacred spaces are more likely to be security guards, parents or judges… They are policing the spaces of commerce, public institutions and the home…” (Sibley 1995, 72). Planners, in their role as guardians of capital, police urban redistribution policy to the detriment of the barrio. Bilingualism is a particularly controversial issue in public policy (Schmidt 1991; Garcia 2003), inherently complicating bicultural approaches to the practice of planning. Without a principled endorsement of bilingual, bicultural relations within barrios, city officials are hopelessly lost in creating inclusionary planning strategies that involve effective minority citizen participation. Resistance to biculturalism within the bureaucracy is an indication of a failure to recognize history and its regressive impact on the urban development process. The impacts of racism on social policy are most apparent when looking at the allocation of redistributive resources over the past thirty years. The politics of difference, the social construction of uneven development, negative community relations, and a legacy of constant urban crises in barrios are embedded in this resistance to biculturalism found within the planning profession. Increased political representation, both substantive and symbolic, is one stage in the process of urban reform. Over the course of the past decade, planning has responded to the demand for increased representation by acknowledging cultural difference, yet this alone does not substitute for the real transformation of power relations between barrios and planning. Contemporary urban policy is also focused on the issue of ethnicity and marginalization. Chicana/o elected officials face increasing demands to “produce positive results” from revitalization programs. Social movements and new urban actors anticipate that increased political power should translate into proactive social policy achievement. Coalitions in which Chicanas/os hold a prominent position are shifting the focus of redevelopment from civic centers into barrios. However, current responses to the urban crises of barrios are inadequate to fundamentally address the major issues of affordable housing, economic development, recreational amenities, and infrastructure. The cultural and political transformation of urban policy has reached a stage that is new and in which the question of public policy is only beginning to focus on the crises of spatial relations in barrios.

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The New Era of Political Empowerment A range of factors acting over the course of the past century have blunted Chicana/o political aspirations. Political marginalization, lack of support from either major party, the power of incumbency, campaign financing, racism within high propensity voting blocs, and voting discrimination were all major external barriers. Political participation in barrios was likewise hindered by a range of issues (Villarreal and Hernandez 1991; Quinones 1990). They included low levels of voter registration, significant percentages of undocumented residents, limited citizenship, few viable Chicana/o candidates, limited bilingual political advertising, and gerrymandered political districts that splintered this voting bloc. This systemic marginalization, external and internal, resulted in substantially lower levels of voting participation among Latinas/os through the 1980s. In addition, the concept of pluralist democracy was a meaningless term for disenfranchised barrio residents who were often chastised for participating in city council meetings. Without representation and political leverage, minority interest groups failed to see the benefit of this purported pluralism (Parenti 1978; Browning et al. 1984; Gaventa 1980). Three major changes in the political arena eventually had a dramatic impact on political access. Two reforms occurred during the 1960s, and the third change was adopted in the 1990s. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 mandated a structural transformation of racist practices that excluded minority political participation. In particular, it called for the abolishment of regulations and criteria limiting access to voting and the opening of the political process to ethnic minorities throughout the country. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 addressed a major problem concerning the way that political districts were developed. This act mandated an end to discriminatory redistricting procedures that directly harmed ethnic communities (Garcia 1996; Skrentny 2002). This led to reforms ensuring fair(er) political representation. This challenge to the practice of gerrymandering, which strongly favors incumbents, unraveled an historical practice enacted to permanently marginalize Chicana/o voters. These changes led to a gradual increase in voter participation among barrio residents. However, initially, this increase did not result in a correspondingly significant increase in political power. In the late 1970s, political mobilization in two major cities, Denver and San Antonio, led to a transformation in political participation and, in San Antonio, the 1981 election of Henry Cisneros, the first Chicano mayor in a major U.S. city (Rosales 2000, 147). Cisneros’ election appeared to indicate that the future had arrived, at least insofar as it might be expected that other cities would experience a similar ethnic political transition. In New Mexico, the 1982 election of Toney Anaya signaled an important political advantage: control of an entire state government (Acuna 1988). However, Anaya only served one term. Frederico Pena’s 1982 election as mayor of Denver (Hero 1992) offered hope that a future, tangible influence over public policy throughout the Southwest was not a foregone conclusion. They “are diversified and complex, reflecting an equally complex social system…(this orientation)…epitomize(s) this new leadership while setting the tone for greater unanimity of…various agendas…to participate in the politics of compromise and coalition formation” (Villarreal and Hernandez 1991, xviii–xix). At this historic juncture, political aspirations associated with these three electoral successes offered a sense of optimism. In relation to urban policy and the future of barrio revitalization, that promise diminished within half a decade.

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One other reform that directly attacked the power of incumbency would essentially restructure political representation in states with significant Latina/o populations. The term-limit movement, though ironically and vehemently opposed by virtually all Chicana/o Democrats, opened the political process to new candidates on unprecedented levels. Term limits generally limit officeholders to two or three terms in the same political office. This policy forced incumbents out of office in record numbers. In California, for example, this reform opened a substantial number of offices during the 1990s. Power relations in the state legislature were restructured during this decade, and Chicanas/os benefited through the achievement of unprecedented influence over state public policy. Numerous cities have also adopted term-limit laws, providing opportunities for new candidates, often minority, to vie for public office. These reforms coincided with an increase in the number of middle-class Chicanas/os moving into suburban areas. The shifting socio-economic character of the community has led to a period of consistently increased political participation in both barrios and suburban zones. In addition, demands on the Democratic Party, in particular the demand to recruit and support minorities, increased the number of candidates seeking political office. During the 1970s and 1980s, most of these candidates were vying for seats in strong minority districts, a factor that virtually ensured their election. This gradual evolution, however, reached a nadir in the late 1980s, when Euro-American incumbents, representing barrios and working-class suburbs, blocked further political gains. The power of incumbency in American politics is virtually insurmountable. The term limit movement restructured the political landscape. With incumbents forced out of office, Chicanas/os were able to gain seats in districts dominated by barrios. At the local and state levels, Chicanas/os ascended to a new height of political representation and empowerment. However, this period has not generated levels of representation approximate to population size. Political parity appears to be, at minimum, one more generation into the future. The era of empowerment has, ironically, placed Chicana/o elected officials in minority status (albeit with significant political leverage) in most major political institutions. In all major cities, with the exception of San Antonio, Chicanas/os do not constitute a numerical majority in city government (Table A.1). In Los Angeles, they control only five out of fifteen council districts. In Phoenix and Sacramento, there are no Chicana/o council representatives. In Denver, Tucson, Houston, and San Jose Chicanas/os are represented on only two or three council districts. Only in San Antonio and El Paso are there 50 precent or more Chicana/o council offices (Table A.1). This power vacuum is also reflected on county-level boards of commissioners or supervisors, which often have only one Latina/o representative. This situation is reflected in Los Angeles County, where only one Chicana, Gloria Molina, has been elected to that political institution in the past century.

Coalition Politics and Minority Status Chicanas/os, even given their minority status, engage in the development of new political coalitions. However, as minorities they are forced into compromises and political negotiations that limit their effectiveness in addressing critical urban issues. Coalitions

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necessarily demand quid pro quo deals that limit attention to urban problems in barrios. This era of coalitions and consensus building, though constituting substantial progress from the past, remains problematic in relation to the magnitude of urban issues confronting the community. Barrios, long ignored by the urban policy cartel, demand significant levels of financial and programmatic support that cannot be achieved when minority, elected officials remain confined to a distinct minority status on city councils of major cities. Majority status in local government has been achieved mainly in small working-class suburbs where Chicanas/os constitute an overwhelming numerical majority. This political transformation has, most generally, occurred during the 1990s, a period in which the Euro-American voters have either moved or aged on a regional level. This transition has created conflictive relations between Euro-Americans attempting to retain political power and different factions within the community. It has also exhibited strains of controversy over the direction and control of public policy (Maciel and Ortiz 1988). In relation to the apparatus of city government, shifts in power often result in periods of contention and conflict. This tendency toward conflict was first exhibited in Crystal City, Texas in the early 1960s (Shockley 1974). Crystal City, which elected the first Chicana/o city council majority in modern political history in 1963, suffered a subsequent and rapid decomposition of community cohesion due to internal friction within the new leadership (Shockley 1974). Numerous small cities struggle through this dynamic in which a new leadership experiences a period of adjustment in regard to control over city finances, personnel, and policy. They are also often confronted with pressures from local activists demanding attention to the urban crises of the barrio. Coalition politics inherently involves conflictive political relations, both within the coalition and with adversarial political factions (Villarreal and Hernandez 1991; De Genova and Ramos-Zayas 2003). The inclusion of Chicanas/os in the electoral arena has forced a realignment of the politics of Southwestern cities. This refashioning of power relations is intersected by competing demands from other established interest groups (Villarreal and Hernandez 1991; De Genova and Ramos-Zayas 2003). Chicana/o elected officials have to maneuver through different political perspectives, often facing opposition to programs oriented toward urban problems in barrios. Chicana/o officials, who are primarily elected from districts that have exhibited longterm support for the liberal/centrist agenda of the Democratic Party, have found philosophical allies on city councils. These officials are generally aligned with liberals, labor unions, and other minority groups. Although they are natural allies in relation to the social history of this region, different ethnic groups are not always in agreement when faced with competition for scant government resources (Browning et al. 2003). Consequently, other alliances have been developed with environmentalists, social progressives, urban reformers, and feminists. Thus, while remaining marginalized within the arena of direct political power, there are other political factions through which Chicanas/os can effectively implement public policy. In relation to coalitions, this tenuous reliance on changing allies places the demands of the barrio at risk to shifting positions and differing visions on urban revitalization strategy. The inherent problem of coalition politics correlates to the types of opponents Chicanas/os encounter in local government, especially since society has yet to completely

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resolve ethnic discord and racism. Conservative, Euro-American dominated political factions endorse an anti-state philosophy in terms of addressing social policy through government programs (Kraft and Furlong 2004; Piven and Cloward 1985). The irony in this is that supporters of this philosophy rely on careers within the state, the very institution that they seek to gradually dismantle. In addition, opposition to civil rights and immigration reforms also influence the direction of local public policy. Interest groups that are opposed to state-centered strategies addressing the urban crises of the barrio include social and/or fiscal conservatives, anti-immigrant advocates and moderate republicans. These conservative factions represent an important voting bloc of high propensity voters, mainly Euro-Americans, who continue to exert a powerful influence in the electoral arena (Gates 2000). Business elites aligned with the urban policy cartel and real estate interests that benefit from state-centered urban policy initiatives (in civic center zones) are also aligned with opposing coalitions. Currently, this faction exhibits long-term tenure in the electoral arena, placing Chicanas/os at a distinct disadvantage in relation to restructuring urban policy. They not only have to negotiate compromises within their coalition allies, but they are then also forced to maneuver through opposing factions determined to minimize the role of the state in urban policy. Conversely, the demands of social justice movements have not subsided in this period of increased political influence. Social and land use conflicts that negatively impact communities demand redress irrespective of who controls political power. Barrios will anticipate a major restructuring of urban policy at the local level, mainly due to the projected increase in influence of Chicanas/os on governance. One major point of contention concerns the use of eminent domain powers within the framework of redevelopment policy. State power mandating land taking, especially from minority property owners, has historically been viewed with suspicion, if not outright hostility (Acuna 1972). Transportation issues, open space, and revitalization programs have yet to be resolved (Gottdiener 1994; Cox 1978). Advocates of proactive policy will continue to lobby and protest government programs that fail to improve the quality of life in urban barrios. This cross-current of political power—locally based social movement demands counterposed to newly evolving electoral power—will complicate relations between the community and politicians. Whether realistic or not, the expectation of increased attention and solutions to the urban crisis will continue to be associated with the emerging Chicana/o factions in city government. No longer wanting to negotiate with other interest groups on the perimeter of governance, minority community and business interests are demanding direct action on a range of urban policy issues. The process of reforming government policy, which historically barred Chicanas/os from having meaningful influence on the way that programs were implemented in barrios, is another target for change. This is related to the allocation of resources, funding, administration, and planning—all of which are necessary preconditions to ensuring proactive implementation of urban programs and projects. This political agenda is proving difficult since Chicana/os currently hold only a minority representation on city councils. While it is conceivable that electoral majorities are possible, voting trends indicate that Chicanas/os face greater obstacles to election in Euro-American-dominated districts at the local level than they do at the state level (where party affiliation is an important consideration among voters). The development of new political coalitions will allow new

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leaders to extract important concessions in relation to urban issues that confront most major cities. Coalition politics signal a major change in the formation of public policy over the past century. However, the magnitude of the urban crisis in the barrio will continue to be vexed by different opinions concerning how to address social problems in a political situation that mandates sharing resources with middle-class neighborhoods. Coalitions have self-limiting aspects that negate the ability of Chicana/o elected officials to focus solely on the barrio. This diffusion of power, at a time when problems such as affordable housing supply and youth alienation have not been fundamentally addressed, results in contentious relations between newly elected council persons and social movement leaders.

Conflicts over the Vision of the City The transformation of political representation places urban policy in a contentious position. Competing political perspectives differ on both the causes of the urban crises and, specifically, on the role of the state in resolving these crises (Kraft and Furlong 2004). Uneven development in barrios is an increasingly contentious issue in city council chambers, and a history of subverting resources and programs to favored economic zones and civic centers continues to be the critical point of urban social movements. Emerging social actors are forcing a debate that is, in essence, a battle over the vision of a new urban future. This debate is centered on Lefebvre’s theoretical conceptualization that the users of space “have a right to the city” (1991a and b; Kofman and Lebas 1996; Kofman 1998), a vested entitlement as opposed to the more variable interests of economic forces that strategize to create elite exclusionary zones and/or constantly plan for the destruction of lower-income communities. Central to this debate is the cultural transformation of the Southwest (and a few other major metropolitan areas) from a Euro-American-dominated political universe to a multiethnic, predominately Latina/o, arena of social and political relations. While other ethnic groups are also demanding inclusion in the political process (in particular Asians and the Central American community), their current regional electoral power remains weak (Hamilton and Chinchilla 2001; Horton 1995). However, Chicanas/os are the second largest ethnic group in the United States. This new majority/minority will necessarily have a direct impact on the composition of governmental institutions over the next quarter century. In numerous cities and counties, and especially in California, they will constitute the majority ethnic group. Inherently, this social and political transition portents renewed conflict on planning policy and the future of urbanization trends. This transition includes struggles over resource allocation within planning and city government in relation to urban crises in barrios. The emerging political base at the local level is correlated with a significant increase in voter participation among Chicanas/os (Garcia 1996). The demographic changes of the past twenty-five years have resulted in a substantial expansion of political districts so that they are now majority, if not predominantly, Chicana/o (Garcia 1996). Prior to the 1980s, these population trends did not translate into electoral gains. However, since that period, electoral advances have achieved some of the political progress first envisioned by political activists in the 1960s. Organizing in barrios, led by the Southwest Voters

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Registration Project, labor unions, and community activists has led to the emergence of a potent, ethnically based voting bloc (de la Garza et al. 1994) that is demanding structural change in public policy. The framework of urban policy, the future of the city, the forces behind the vision of growth, development, and revitalization have become the focal point of controversy in urban planning. Urban and social issues correlated with uneven development of barrios have not fundamentally changed. The past history of reinvestment in neighborhoods and commercial districts is a history of failure. The supply crisis of affordable housing appears to have no end in sight. Inner city communities are the centers of speculative real estate investment that only serves to magnify this urban crisis. One aspect of speculative real estate investment, density dumping, results in the building of mega apartment complexes in areas zoned for lower residential densities. These types of developments further complicate conditions at overcrowded local schools and inadequate recreational opportunities, urban congestion, and related social problems. Cities do not demand sufficient development fees to offset the actual social cost of large-scale developments (Bradbury et al. 1982; Levine 1980), and so they exacerbate urban crises. Environmental considerations involving land use patterns, pollution, and liveable neighborhoods are related to uneven development. Noncompatible land uses related to schools and residential districts are a major problem in inner-city areas (Bullard 1994). Industrial zones that generate pollutants and toxins create serious public health risk to adjacent residential zones (Bullard 1994). The ambience of barrio life is complicated by an acute lack of open space and recreational amenities. This deficit is most pronounced in relation to programs for younger Latinas, for whom gender inequities severely limit recreational opportunities. Air pollution in inner-city areas is a major cause of permanent lung-related diseases and respiratory illness among youth (Pansing et al. 1989; Kleinman et al. 1989). Lead paint, water contamination, and the deteriorating condition of housing also pose serious health problems. In fact, slum lords constitute a major public health problem due to their refusal to maintain properties as required by building codes. Thus, environmental quality concerns have become a major social and political focus of barrio social movements. These issues are central in the looming public policy battle over the viability of the top-down civic center model. This model, advocated by the urban policy cartel, opposes community-based revitalization that equitably reallocates resources into urban barrios. This debate, primary to the creation of Chicana/o social movements in the 1970s, is a major challenge to the emerging minority political establishment. For the first time in the political history of the Southwest, Chicanas/os have political leverage sufficient to force this debate into an arena that had previously prospered from the marginalization of barrios. In essence, this is a conflict over the future vision of the city and the question of whether the barrio will finally take precedence in the urban policy arena of revitalization. The answer to this question rests in the ability to implement a pro-social policy urban agenda that transfers redistributive funds into barrios. Designing new programs, proposing different projects and planning for the future are meaningless without fundamental changes in the redistributive policy leading to the reconstruction of barrios. The current transformation of the political arena is an indication that the future is now, that is, if political change implies substantive progress toward addressing uneven development and urban policy oriented toward barrio revitalization.

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This historical transition will inevitably address a range of policy issues that the urban policy cartel either does not possess the capacity to resolve or refuses to address. This cartel has had over four decades to succeed in their policies. But the record indicates that this tenure has produced minuscule benefit to barrios. Elite conceptualization of urban public policy has resulted in the failure of that very urban policy to address urban crises in barrios. These elites have actively pursued a policy orientation mandating uneven development in barrios in direct correlation to the benefits derived through urban policy for favored economic zones. The academic literature addressing social policy strategy in barrios is extensive and makes up an essential component of graduate-level planning courses and consultant reports submitted to local government (mainly directed and produced by Euro-American professionals). In fact, the academic, government, and consultant universes of the planning profession have maintained an effective glass ceiling (Hoch 1994). Thus the litany of policy failures is a well-trod agenda that has effectively limited the influence of planning in regard to the economic, environmental, and social conditions of barrios. Irrespective of who controls the levels of public policy or the actual intent of those managing the arena of decision making, readdressing these issues does have value for the future. The most important issue is substantially increasing the supply of affordable housing. Economic revitalization of small businesses is an important component of any revitalization strategy (Hamilton and Chinchilla 2001; Pastor et al. 2000; Wainwright 2000). This type of revitalization would potentially increase opportunities for the local workforce and would increase business expansion for a sector that has historically been negatively impacted by regressive banking and lending policies (Dymski et al. 1991). The quality and reliability of public transportation is another critical factor for a sector of labor that is often priced out of car ownership (Frazier et al. 2003). In addressing uneven development, planning itself requires structural transformation. Cities have yet to fundamentally resolve a range of social problems linked to the built environment. An urban reality is the fact that the modern city has become anti-youth. The pace of auto traffic, adult predators, diminishing recreational resources, and pedestrian safety inhibit the social experience of the youth generation. The dearth of recreational programs and open space is a symbolic message that older generations lack compassion and concern for the social experience of youth in urban society. The historically poor quality of public education in inner-city areas is responsible for the extremely low educational attainment levels of minority youth. These negative urban social issues have created and re-created generations of alienated youth, a portion of who view gangs and antisocial activities as a viable alternative to school and community. In this context, the alienation of urban youth is a point on which urban policy and the failure of revitalization strategies bear responsibility.

Racism and Chicana/o Urban Policy Civic center revitalization and its concurrent rationale, “Trickle-Down Economics,” is, in reality, the equivalent of urban policy redlining. It is no less than the modern version of social and economic apartheid, a pontifical attire shielding the fallacies of planning theory and practice.

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This society has advanced beyond the bitter, dark era of rancid racism that characterized social relations from the founding of this country. Blatant discrimination, while not totally eradicated, has been substantially reduced. However, in relation to political and economic power, the legacy of racism is a revisionist replication of regressive past social practices. The political arena has exhibited a level of gradualist change, far below parity, in relation to the exercise of power (Quinones 1990). The strategic interlinkages between the private and administrative sectors (an arena intractably linked to public policy) (Peterson 1981) and an historic glass ceiling that actively discriminates against women and minorities prevents minorities from achieving access to the social hierarchy of power (Bowser and Hunt 1996; Skrentny 2002). Chicanas/os are grossly underrepresented in key decision-making positions that involve urban programs and funding. Thus, while society has changed, the terrain of power relations has yet to comprehensively acknowledge the legacy of racism—economically, socially, and in the urban arena—and resolve acute barriers hindering the access of minorities and women in the most significant areas of state authority (Browning et al. 2003; Anderson 1988). In relation to the process of planning and redevelopment, intertwined within academia and the public and private sectors, racism remains a regressive and influential factor in urban policy. The impact of racism on urban and social policy is manifested in uneven development, the funneling of redistributed funding into favored economic zones, directed mismanagement, and a history of failure in relation to the implementation of revitalization programs since the 1960s. Why? During the inception of the War on Poverty, local elected officials aligned with the urban policy cartel adamantly refused to endorse a participatory citizen-oriented model of public policy development. They also vehemently attacked internal critics, advocate planners, who proposed adopting new methods and practices to establish an inclusive arena of negotiation with disenfranchised communities in the determination of future urban policy. “Letting the people decide” in relation to local community control over urban policy (Boyte 1984) was deemed tantamount to a surrender of Euro-American politico-cultural dominance. Resistance to major reforms emanating from the Civil Rights era’s impact on the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) programs was a significant barrier against minority communities demanding an inclusionary political process for the development of revitalization strategy (Friedan and Kaplan 1975; Marris and Rein 1967). Racism and exclusion within the planning function was preferable to nurturing the historic march to a transformation of social and political relations. In the critical, initial era of major HUD programs, including an unprecedented national distribution of federal fiscal assistance to cities, decisions concerning the direction and location of redistributive resources reified a top-down model of planning policy (Parenti 1978; Piven and Cloward 1977). The consequences of enactment of this policy were, and are, uneven development. The dominance of the urban policy cartel worked to exclude barrios from the benefits of HUD programs. The cartel utilized the “statistics of poverty” to legitimate annual applications for Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funding, while expending CDBG resources on civic center zones and other areas controlled by real estate and development interests. It is within this context, the actual distribution of resources, that racism in planning is most apparent. The negligible impact of revitalization programs in barrios—as opposed to the substantial advantage in resource

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extraction for civic center programs—during this historic period established a pattern of policy discrimination in the distribution of financial support and its relationship to planning. The ethnic divide between minority communities and city officials involved in determining urban policy has resulted in geographies of exclusion and difference centered on class, gender, and ethnicity (Sibley 1995; Anderson 1988; Kofman 1998), a systemic process that has created and re-created zones of uneven development throughout the Southwest. Within the dark confines of racism, urban form and difference intersect with public policy related to a regressive history of failed barrio revitalization proposals. The resistance of the urban cartel to barrio-based social movements characterized the first two decades of the CDBG program. Social actors, having no direct political power and scant resources, led vigorous oppositional movements to counter the hegemonic power of local cartels. The influence of barrio movements on urban sociology is reflected in Touraine’s analysis that, “(Today)…their protest is directed against the apparatuses, discourses, and invocations of external dangers that stand in the way of their affirmations of their projects, the definition of their own objectives, and their direct engagement in the conflicts, debates, and negotiations they wish for… The task of sociology is to break through the sewer of dead ideologies, as much as through the illusions of pure individualism or the fascination of decadence, in order to bring to light the presence of the actors and to help their voices be heard” (1988, 18). It is within this context that the social value of the barrio and social justice movements influence the discourse on democracy, pluralism, and social relations. While these movements experienced only a limited level of success in their attempts to defend community spatial integrity, the histories of these movements, underappreciated in the planning literature, redefine and renew the vitality of barrio culture. Urban social justice movements had only minimal influence over long-term local redevelopment and revitalization policy. Without resources and political access, sustaining effective social movements is a nebulous proposition (Institute for the Study of Labor and Economic Crisis 1982). A change from oppositional politics in urban policy occurred during the mid-1980s, a time when a few Chicanas/os ascended to electoral office at the local level. The main problem was that an historic strategy that negated barrio revitalization activities was supported by an entrenched political establishment that politicians in minority status could not infiltrate. The controversy over the direction of barrio-oriented urban policy would not begin in earnest until the mid-1980s. During the 1990s, a period of increased migration, nationally and in the Southwest, created a nativist movement that opposed Chicanas/os. An earlier anti-Latino movement, initiated within a faction of the growth control movement in Monterey Park, California, was the first regressive political response to projected demographic transformation (Horton 1995; Saito 1998). The English Only movement utilized the initiative process as an avenue to attack the Chicana/o community in California, subsequently spanning a national movement that supported this philosophy (Horton 1995; Saito 1998). Other antiimmigrant movements mobilized in Arizona and Texas. In reality, these movements were a convenient political vehicle for challenging the pending political move of Chicanos into positions of power. The anti-immigration movements eventually succumbed to political and organizational problems along with strong opposition from Chicana/o leadership in the Southwest.

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This movement was apparently only the vanguard of a renewed anti-Latina/o political strategy designed to assist the aspirations of then California Governor Pete Wilson. In his position as governor, Wilson spearheaded a series of initiatives and policies that proposed terminating bilingualism and biculturalism in the state. One initiative proposed to expel all children of immigrant parents from the public school system (Chavez and Martinez 1988). This provision, along with the entire Proposition 187, was ruled unconstitutional in federal court. Another initiative, Proposition 227, which was successful, ended affirmative action in the state. The political winter created by this racist anti-immigrant strategy influenced public policy throughout the region. This regressive nativist sentiment, advocated by the governor of California translated into opposition toward urban policy in barrios. The racist strategy was clear: utilize public policy to negate the cultural transformation of California and to diminish the influence of the Chicana/o community through fear mongering, hate, and divisive media attacks. It was within this highly charged political environment that Chicanas/os gained their most significant political leverage at the state and local levels. However, this era of divisive public discourse overshadowed serious attention to fundamental urban policy in barrios. This nativist resistance to the significant increase in political representation of Chicanas/os is related to the future formulation of social and urban policy. Throughout the Southwest, political marginalization is gradually being deconstructed, election by election. The urban policy cartel, representative of reactionary voting blocs, is currently being forced to negotiate a transformative political terrain. The historical impact of racism on social policy is only presently being addressed in a fundamental manner. EuroAmerican planning directors, redevelopment officials, and politicians, ensconced in a tradition of narrow, exclusionary discourse are confronted with a new reality. In relation to the way that this translates into addressing the decomposition of urban barrios, change is slow, especially within the history of discrimination and racism in urban policy.

Changing Political Mandates The cultural transformation of cities in the Southwest and selected other metropolitan areas is ushering in the dawn of a new era in which political control is transitioning from a Euro-American-held monopoly into a multi-ethnic socio-political universe. The forum of the city will continue to be the focal point of policy change and controversy. The battle for funding and resource allocation for barrios will continue to test the limits of pluralism. Although Chicanas/os remain in minority status within government, they have significantly increased their political influence on planning and redevelopment. The urban policy cartel, which remains situated as a potent political and economic force at the local level, also is being forced to re-strategize its policy initiatives. The question of urban policy is at the center of attempts to reform the planning function. Chicana/o politicians have an opportunity, for the first time, to reform the urban revitalization process. This involves demands on planning and government to address a history of uneven development in barrios. It will also require increased political representation during the next decade to develop a power base equal to the task of transforming an entrenched bureaucratic institutional logic. A component of that logic

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can be found in the vestiges of racism and classicism in planning (Parenti 1978; Hoch 1994; Piven and Cloward 1977). In relation to emerging political empowerment, barrio leaders are demanding that elected officials “produce positive results” in terms of the focus and benefit of urban policy. This is a major challenge, given the coalition-driven power relations that currently exist. Coalitions tend to diminish influence on government policy in relation to citywide urban issues, fiscal constraints, and competing demands. The urban crises of barrios require concerted action to force change in policy, redistribution, and philosophy. Multiculturalism, encouraged by Southwestern Chicanas/os in the land use process has created space for a limited level of reforms, mainly in the public communication function of planning. This change is superficial in relation to the power of the direction of revitalization activities and funding. Multiculturalism in planning incorporates the entire arena of practice, including administrative and managerial direction, allocation of funds, endorsement of an egalitarian approach to community perspectives, and empowerment of disenfranchised groups for development of internally driven visions of their urban future. The challenge of change in relation to the future of planning is the question of whether empowerment can translate into a proactive social policy agenda that fundamentally addresses the urban crisis of barrios, arrests terminal uneven development, and reverses decades of policy failure.

14 Chicanas/os and the Urban Challenges of the Twenty-First Century Chicana/o urbanism in the new millennium signals the middle period of the ethnic transformation of urban spatial relations. In all major cities of the Southwest and selected cities with significant Latina/o populations, this ethnic group is reconfiguring the sociocultural meaning of urban life. The population now enjoys a modicum of political empowerment and is confronting urban policy in locations unaccustomed to difference. Whether Chicanas/os are located in the centers of political power or the periphery, city planning is forced to defend its past vision on urban form and policy. Barrio urban issues—affordable housing, middle-class flight, revitalization strategies, infrastructure maintenance, and inclusionary planning—are now mainstream considerations. The era of controversy and protest that characterized the relationship between Chicanas/os and the planning profession are transitioning into a new framework in which the reins of power are no longer totally controlled by Euro-American (mainly male) elites, either in the bureaucracy or the legislature. This shift in power relations, however, has not dramatically changed the nature of the contests over urban policy and redistributive strategies. Increasing urbanization in regions with substantial Chicana/o populations is projected to continue for the next quarter century (Suro and Singer 2002). This transition presents a host of challenges to the urban policy cartel and the emerging minority political establishment. It also presents an opportunity for social movements demanding fundamental changes to the historical orientation of revitalization policy. The history of administrative practices which devalued the interests and demands of Chicanas/os (Acuna 1988,1996; Garcia 1994; Bullard and Feagin 1991) is at the center of contention. Enlightenment, egalitarianism, and equity are the goals in a new era of proactive urban reform, but it is a potential that has rarely been achieved (Krumholtz and Forester 1990). The entire fabric of urbanization in broad sectors of the United States are directly impacted by these changes. Thus, the function of planning and urban redistribution must address the question of the barrio and social demands of the community. Policy responses to demographic change in Chicana/o cities suggest that there is significant resistance to a new era of multicultural planning. An elitist model based on the demands of the real estate industry remains the primary focus of urban policy (Peterson 1981; Checkoway 1984). Trickle-down theory—i.e., “eventually it will come”—is the predicament of the barrio. A few cities—Denver, Pico Rivera, San Antonio, and San Francisco—have implemented programs that directly benefit barrio commercial interests, which in turn has had a direct and beneficial impact on the broader socio-economic conditions of these cities. Los Angeles, Phoenix, Tucson, and Dallas-Fort Worth are typical of places that neglect barrio issues in favor of bolstering more prosperous zones. Raymond Williams’ assessment of nomad capitalism applies to these cities: “To destroy

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actual communities in the name of ‘community’ or ‘the public’ is then evil as well as false. Yet this is the implacable logic of the social order which is now so strongly coming through: the logic of nomad capitalism which exploits actual places and people and then (as it suits it) moves on” (Williams 1983, 124). Revitalization in these cities transfers subsidies to elite global investors, and they are then dispersed for projects that have little relation to economic necessity—mega sports stadiums, office towers, malls. Redistributive policy readily accommodates this class of investors. These cities expend substantially less time, money, and effort on terminal crises in barrios vis-à-viz the civic center. The relatively few successes indicate that the politics of urban revitalization will only reluctantly shift to address crises in barrios.

A New Urban Agenda The legacy of uneven development has left barrios vulnerable to problems that have seriously impaired localized efforts to achieve social and economic stabilization. The social and economic are intertwined in lower-income areas, especially areas with significant youth populations. Alienated youth, with limited educational and employment skills, find solace in antisocial activities, violent and/or nonviolent, in which they place themselves and the larger community at risk. Failed urban policies that result in deteriorating infrastructures represent an institutional framework that signals to each succeeding youth generation society’s lack of concern for their future. Without actual and/or symbolic change that structurally improves in the quality of life within barrios, a common reaction of youth will continue to be antisocial and destructive. The burgeoning scale of urban barrios throughout the United States begs the question: when does the barrio finally become the primary focus of attention for redistribution policy? While redistribution has had a definitive impact on favored civic center zones during this era, Chicana/o neighborhoods remain mired in a litany of urban crises. Yet the planning function constantly rationalizes massive subsidies to sports stadiums, hotels, commercial projects, special districts, and exclusive “professionally affordable enclaves.” These are subsidies that rarely materialize in barrios. The crisis of the barrio can no longer be sequestered in a normative urban analysis that is based on a dated model of a “needs assessment.” Everyone knows the needs, and the context of barrio urban crises is no secret. There must be a focus on the inherent conflicts between ethnic groups and reactionary elites who control not only the location of new development but the planning apparatus itself. Decades of favoritism and elite alliances at the local level have produced a basic redistribution policy where resources are not allocated according to social need. The corruption of process is also mirrored in the corruption of practice. Without acknowledgment of this policy failure, in which uneven development has been fostered, if not planned, there will be no new urban agenda in barrios. Thus, a fundamental question confronting social movement leaders is: how will the policy apparatus of the state change in relation to the demographic and urban transformation of the Southwest? If history is a guide, without continued oppositional consciousness, change is beyond the capacity of the urban policy cartel. The past, however, should not be allowed to contain the social demands of urban barrios. The geographic expansion of Chicana/o urban space is one of the most

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significant phenomena of the past twenty-five years. While East Los Angeles (East L.A.) remains an ever-expanding Chicana/o city, barrios throughout the Southwest are also influencing spatial and social relations. Phoenix, Denver, San Antonio, El Paso, and San Jose have experienced a similar period of Chicana/o urbanism. In these cities, overall growth directly correlates with an influx of minorities into areas with a history of exclusion. A new urban agenda has emerged that is focusing unprecedented attention on innovative redistribution strategies. At the center is the demand for increased reinvestment in lower-income neighborhoods. But overcrowded, overpriced, and substandard housing conditions constitute the most important issue confronting families attempting to balance low-wage injustice with household responsibilities. The supply issue, directly linked to inadequate subsidized production of affordable housing, is a major cause of social tension and labor unrest in cities. The housing crisis has led not only to overcrowding, it has resulted in dangerous (often illegal) adaptive reuse of garages and other spaces, where families are charged monthly rents for single rooms. The wage demands of laborers are directly linked to the high cost of housing, and the social alienation of youth results in part from the bleak socio-environmental conditions engendered by poor-quality, inadequate housing. Cities that continue to subsidize housing for professionals under the rubric of redevelopment are at the core of this crisis. Shifting the focus to the housing supply in barrios is the initial phase of a reinvigorated urban strategy. Mass transportation, especially in metropolitan areas that mimic Los Angeles’ urban form, will increasingly be a key issue for a significant percentage of barrio residents. In regions where the car culture dominates, public transportation is deemed a necessary evil at best, and adequate resources are not allocated to meet demand (Pastor et al. 2000). Public transportation is viewed as a separate urban function, with a different bureaucracy and funding stream unrelated to conventional urban planning. Major rail proposals have emerged on occasion in the past two decades, but they have been buried in administrative morasses. Ultimately, the demands of the substantial ridership in barrios have been given short shrift. The reconstruction of Chicana/o business districts will not come from the construction of big box stores. Small business formation is the anchor of the barrio economy and this factor will not dramatically change given the nature of the relationship that exists between barrio consumers and retailers. The gradual demise of numerous redevelopmentfinanced urban malls shows how an overreliance on this formula failed to “revitalize” favored economic zones (Fowler 1992). What must be acknowledged is the fact that cities have historically ignored the economic demand that exist in barrios, even to the point of reinvesting in failed ventures a second or third time. When will the failure of the top-down civic center model finally break its near stranglehold on the imagination of planners who insist that the prime location is somewhere distant from barrio commercial districts? The initial premise—that economic vitality within the barrio increases entry level employment, recirculates capital locally, and improves both the viability of private sector reinvestment and the tax base—remains valid. The economy of the barrio proved to be resilient during a period in which financial support for lower-income commercial districts was shunned by the urban policy cartel. What would happen to the barrio economy if the hundreds of millions in redistribution programs were actually invested internally? Would this lead to similar mega project

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failures intended to “save a city’s tax base,” or could those businesses that have survived and succeeded in spite of directed disinvestment actually aid the city in addressing the crises of barrio economies? The phrase “small is beautiful” which comes from the environmental movement, also has currency within Chicana/o business districts. What would actually be new in planning is an admission of failure of trickle-down logic and a concerted strategy to utilize state subsidies to finance barrio commercial interests on a long-term basis. Complex urban issues are being approached from an environmental perspective in barrios throughout the Southwest (Pena 1998; Marquez 1998). Following a strategy initially developed by social movements in the 1970s, community leaders have increasingly relied on state and federal environmental regulations as a key political tool for dealing with land use controversies. Earlier social movements had utilized environmental logic in defense of barrio spatial relations, and from this legacy community-based oppositional movements have increasingly incorporated environmentalism into challenges to regressive planning and development proposals. Whether the issue is a massive expansion of a dump adjacent to a residential neighborhood in the working-class Chicana/o suburb of Huntington Park, California, or the dumping of hazardous toxins in Texas’ South Rio Grande Valle, social actors have demanded that barrio environmental problems be addressed. The emphatic insistence that these issues are also important in relation to barrio urban policy has dramatically changed the planning profession’s treatment of environmental issues. The current era of environmental enlightenment in barrios, however, is not reflected in traditional environmental analysis, which remains dated within a wilderness, parklands orientation. There has been only limited legislative attention paid toward reformulating the substance of environmental impact review (Gottlieb 1993) to accurately reflect the urban character of environmentalism practiced in barrio planning struggles. The urban characteristics of the environmental justice movement differ significantly from what was envisioned four decades ago when the first environmental laws and regulations were adopted. The next stage of the environmental justice movement is a commitment from the entire environmental movement to insist on major reforms in environmental impact analysis that realistically address how the impact review processes addresses issues affecting communities where 85 percent of the nation’s population resides—urban areas. Environmental review that incorporates an urban focus as the center of impact review constitutes a truly new environmentalism, a policy shift that would allow shifting land use challenges from the courts to the administrative process. The court system as land use arbitrator of last resort is, in essence, exclusionary and elitist. Barrio-based social movements have too few financial resources to engage in expensive court challenges. Thus, reforming environmental law to incorporate socio-demographic and socioeconomic impacts that correlate to the reality of barrio everyday life would enhance the practice of environmentally grounded urban policy in defense of barrio spatial interests. A final policy issue is the acute scarcity of recreational programs and open space within barrios. Often regional open space policy, which is perceived as proactive, is in fact oppressive to the spatial conditions of barrios. State and federal policy are overwhelmingly oriented toward the allocation of resources where relatively few people reside. It should be acknowledged that protection of natural resources, beautiful spaces, and permanent preservation are legitimate public policy goals. However, when state and

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federal policy ignore or bypass places where the demand is highest, the policy is both exclusionary and regressive. An example of this is in the Los Angeles region, an area in which inner-city barrios have among the worst per capita level of open space in this society. Conversely, for the past two decades hundreds of millions of dollars in public money have been spent along the Malibu bluffs and coastline to purchase hundreds of acres of open space. Who resides in these hillsides and canyons? Some of the wealthiest individuals in the global economy (Davis 1998). Yet less than thirty to fifty miles away, a massive population in predominantly minority neighborhoods surrounding Los Angeles’ civic center have received a combined annual allocation of roughly six million dollars for parks from both the city and county of Los Angeles during a similar timeframe. This skewed public policy cannot be justified given the stark difference in income, location, and need. Do millions of Chicana/o youth either need or utilize hillside open space adjacent to mansions far from their urban environment? Or do they need recreational resources within the barrio? Yet, tens of millions of dollars are still being expended on useless canyons when barrio youth have the streets as their “open space amenity.” Only in the past few years has limited attention to this gross resource discrepancy been forthcoming. In sum, addressing the quality of life in barrios requires attention to how communities function, their cultural history, and how urban form blends the social. A new urban agenda cannot simply be a roster of urban redevelopment amenities. Eminent domain and people removal are not the sole policy problem. Rather, it is the more systemic issue of development intensities that continue to destabilize community. Thus reform requires a significant transformation in both redistributive policy and the planning process. Raymond Williams indicates how this transformation should occur: “It is a matter of everyday experience that rational people arrive at different conclusions, and that the public interest…is a complex and interactive network of different real interests. A sharing plan begins from this acknowledgment of diversity, and encourages the true social processes of open discussion, negotiation, and agreement” (Williams 1983, 286). This policy shift, if it is to succeed, has to be based on the barrio and its residents. It will come from a mutualista, communal logic that moves past the failures of rational functional planning. The history of urban social movements indicates a vibrant opposition to regressive and/or unequal distribution of resources. This conflictual advocacy can reemerge in the current era. The social production and reproduction of space in urban barrios demands a change in the historic conflict over who benefits directly from redistributive policy. While the War on Poverty tried to shift federal support to declining inner-city communities, this approach did not compel the urban policy cartel to actually assist the urban underclass (Friedan and Kaplan 1975; O’Connor 1999). Instead, it provided a massive subsidy to powerful real estate interests (Beauregard 1993; Bullard et al. 1994). Any benefit accruing to barrios was assumed to be a residual effect of civic centered redevelopment strategies. This is the sort of policy that failed to incorporate the totality of interests in lower-income neighborhoods. Community empowerment was a major corrective to this, and the strategy remains relevant to local communities trying to gain control over their future. The top-down model endorsed by planning has failed. Barrio crises are also reflected in crises in technical and political approaches to urban policy and planning. Thus, in

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addressing social reproduction, changing the terrain of social and political relations in the urban policy arena is paramount.

The Future Is Today The trajectory of Chicana/o urban geography in the Southwest, and the nation, is transforming urban society in numerous unanticipated directions. Language, food, cultural practice, fiestas, and multicultural identity are manifestations of changing social relations. The concept of barrio community, an everyday experience centered around intimate socialization and a pedestrian-oriented scale, is, in reality, the future. El barrio has numerous lessons for the future or urbanization. The pale claims of new urbanism—in reality, failed suburbia—that social connection is the next trend in planning policy has ignored life in the barrio. It is within the everyday life of barrio reality that “old urbanism” has not fundamentally changed. In fact, new urban theory is both ahistorical and elitist. It proceeds as if barrio life has no meaning, history, or lessons for Euro-American-dominated suburbia. The failure of the socialization of suburbia is no excuse for a theory based on an avoidance of acknowledging the success of barrios. The problem is that these theorists have also failed to look out of their steel and glass towers, beyond their institutional email and architectural experience (sic) at something mundane and simple—a walk in the barrio. That admission of guilt would be the only aspect that is truly new about new urbanism. The incompetence of this “new theory” is a metaphor for the incompetence of another old theory—that civic center zones controlled by the urban cartel are the key to urban revitalization policy (Squires 1994; O’Connor 1999; Feagin and Parker 1990). In city after city, decade after decade, planners, the urban policy cartel, and policy institutes have pontificated in empty hotel rooms and classrooms of bored students about how, through “policy magic” redistributing resources to elites will benefit lower-income communities grandly in the end. This has no basis in reality in the sense that lowerincome urban barrios have never structurally benefited from this economic development mythology. While the myth has created its own reality, it has never accomplished what it irrationally promised—revitalization barrios after civic center reconstruction. The future mandate of planning and the policy arena is to force cities to abandon the fiction that economic benefits flow from the civic center to barrios. If not, the future will enter into a renewed period of conflict between the urban policy cartel and barrio leadership committed to community-based revitalization strategies. Alain Touraine, in addressing the centrality of the social site as a political and territorial collectivity challenging the social logic of market forces asks, “Can we still speak of democracy when culture and the economy, or the world of meaning and world of signs, have been divorced, when political power no longer dominates either an economy that has been internationalized or cultures that have been defined as heritages rather than interpretations of new practices?” (2000, 240). If revitalization designed for lower-income communities is to have any meaning, then those resources dedicated for that purpose should be confined to those specific areas. Policies such as approving exemptions, changing categories related to income qualifications for “affordable housing subsidies,” and stretching definitions (for instance

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blight) into meaningless oblivion need to be vigorously challenged. Chicana/o leaders must also bluntly address the inherent racism in planning practice and revitalization policy. Urban policy that provides structural benefits to barrios is diametrically opposed to the trickle-down sloganeering that has failed to revitalize barrios throughout the Southwest. Reorienting the planning profession to abandon its past is a difficult but necessary process. Chicana/o social justice movements focusing on revitalization policy have been the main avenue for policy intervention. Increased political representation offers structural leverage to change planning’s past and produce policies and programs that directly benefit barrios. The emerging leadership, whether elected or community-based, will continue to advocate policies in defense of Chicana/o urban culture while maneuvering through the imposition of new fiscal and technical constraints. The city of Chicanas/os—East L.A. as symbolic space—has evolved to dominate a significant urban geography in Los Angeles. In the twenty-first century there will be innumerable replications of this urbanism throughout the Southwest. Regions and cities are dramatically changing in terms of culture, ethnicity, demands on urban amenities, and constant growth impacted by dramatic demographic transformations. While Southern California exhibits the most significant Chicana/o geography (encompassing lowerincome urban barrios, working-class suburbs and, in the past decade, middle-class suburbs), the demographic growth of Chicanas/os is influencing urban centers throughout the country. The social, political, economic, and cultural lessons of Los Angeles, and inherently the Southwest, are being replicated in regions that have never encountered barrio culture. Although urban policy conflicts remain problematic in the Southwest, the socio-political dynamics of this urban transition has created the impetus for a recognition that barrios are an essential component of urban policy throughout the nation. It is within this new socio-cultural history that Touraine offers a perspective on the future of cultural relations: The new innovatory practices are…developing at the local level. The creative and emancipatory initiatives are coming from the base. Without the freedom of the Subject and the subject’s attempts to bring about the recomposition of the world and to reunite elements that have been divorced and that have come into conflict, interpersonal and inter-cultural communication are impossible. Pure tolerance and the acceptance of differences do not in themselves make inter-cultural communication possible. And democracy would be meaningless if it ignored social and cultural differences. Or meant only that we are all citizens who are equal in the eyes of the law. Democracy is real only when it permits social and cultural rights to be defended because they are concrete form of the right to be a Subject…in such a way as to give individuals their creative freedom (Touraine 2000, 301). Chicana/o urbanism will increasingly place pressure on planning, redevelopment, and federal urban policy. El Barrio, symbolic and tangible, is in the midst of a transformative period. This change is entering the third period of demographic transformation. The first stage—segregated urban barrios socially constructed from the historic migration of labor

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from Mexico into the Southwest—was followed by a second, which saw the transition of a significant Chicana/o population into older working-class suburbs. In this final stage, Chicanas/os are moving into all regional sectors of metropolitan areas, including middleclass outer suburbs. With the spatial reconstruction and dispersal of El Barrio across the metropolitan region and throughout the nation, urban form and culture have entered a new era.

Appendix

Urban Maps: Six Cities in relation to the 1970, 1980, and 2000 Census Data

Map 1.a

Map 1.b

Appendix

Map 1.c

Map 2.a

Map 2.b

269

Appendix

Map 2.c

Map 3.a

270

Appendix

Map 3.b

Map 3.c

271

Appendix

Map 4.a

Map 4.b

Map 4.c

272

Appendix

Map 5.a

Map 5.b

273

Appendix

Map 5.c

Map 6.a

274

Appendix

Map 6.b

Map 6.c

275

Appendix

276

Table A.1 Chicana/o Political Representation in Selected Cities, 2004 City/No. of districts Albuquerque/9 Denver/13 El Paso/8 Houston/14 Los Angeles/15 Phoenix/8 Sacramento/7 San Antonio/10 San Jose/10 Tucson/6 Total Seats/100

Mayor City Council EuroEuroAfroChicana/o Chicana/o Asian American American American X X X X X X X X X X

3 3 4 2 5 0 0 5 2 2 26

6 8 4 7 7 7 4 3 6 4 56

2 3 3 1 2 2 2

2

1

15

3

Table A.2 Latina/o Population, Total Population and Percentage Change: Selected Southwest Cities 1980, 1990, and 2000 Census Data Cities Latino 1980 Latino 1990 % Change Total pop. 1980 Total pop. 1990 % Change Latino 1990 Latino 2000 % Change Total pop. 1990 Total pop. 2000 % Change

Albuquerque Denver 112,084 127,796 14% 331,767 367,581 11.7% 127,796 179,075 40.1% 367,581 448,607 22%

L.A.

Phoenix San Antonio San Jose

92,348 816,076 116,736 107,636 1,391,735 193,722 16.5% 70.5% 65.9% 492,365 2,966,850 789,704 472,870 3,483,636 933,045 −3.9% 17.4% 18.1% 107,636 1,391,735 193,722 175,704 1,719,073 449,972 63.2% 23.5% 132% 472,870 3,483,636 933,045 554,636 3,694,820 1,321,045 17.2% 6% 41.5%

421,954 492,584 16.7% 785,880 839,116 6.7% 492,584 671,394 36.3% 839,116 1,144,646 36.4%

140,529 203,384 44.7% 629,442 744,894 18.3% 203,384 269,989 32.7% 744,894 894,943 20.1%

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277

Table A.3 Percentage Latina/o Population in Relation to Total Population: Selected Southwest Cities 1980, 1990, and 2000 Census Data Cities

Albuquerque Denver L.A. Phoenix San Antonio San Jose

1980 Census 1990 Census 2000 Census

33.4% 34.7% 39.9%

18.7% 27.5% 14.7% 22.7% 39.9% 20.7% 31.6% 46.5% 34%

53.7% 58.7% 58.6%

22.3% 27.3% 30.1%

Table A.4 Percentage Increase in Latina/o Population between 1980 and 2000 Selected Southwest Cities Cities % Increase

Albuquerque Denver L.A. Phoenix San Antonio San Jose 59.7%

90.2% 110.6% 285.4%

59.1%

92.1%

Table A.5 City of Santa Ana (Orange County, CA) Latina/o Population and Total Population 1980, 1990, and 2000 Census Data Census Data Latino 1980 90,646 Latino 1990 191,410 % Change 111% Total pop. 1980 203,713 Total pop. 1990 293,920 % Change 44.2% Latino 1990 191,410 Latino 2000 257,097 % Change 34.3% Total pop. 1990 293,920 Total pop. 2000 337,977 % Change 14.9%

%Latina/o per Tot. Pop.

44.5% 65.1%

76.1%

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Interviews: Sandra Figueroa, July 19, 1999, Los Angeles, CA. Serafin Espinoza, October 5, 1989, Pasadena, CA. David Lechuga, May 18, 1987, San Bernardino, CA.

Index

A advocacy planning movement, 109–110, 191–196, 209, 277–278, 294 Affirmative action California initiatives on, 259, 296 economic impact of, 254 in education, 68, 137–138 focus of, 69, 107–108 government contracts and, 69, 123, 126, 135, 138–139 income levels and, 68–69 proposition 187 and, 227, 296 urbanization patterns and, 68 Afro-Americans El Centro de Accion Social and, 203 in Los Angeles, 9, 78, 84, 245 planning literature on, 6 settlement patterns of, 170 agriculture Bracero Program, 47, 52 labor demand by, 31, 45, 60 “Law of the Indies” and, 30 pre-colonial, 3 railroads and, 29 residence patterns and, 92 settlement patterns and, 31–33, 35 UFW and, 242, 257–258 air quality AQMD and, 213, 226–227 birth defects and, 213, 216, 227–230 cancer-related illness and, 216, 229–230 diesel emissions and, 214, 251 in industrial sectors, 211, 213–214, 225–227 landfills and, 216, 227–230 LCSC and, 226–227 in Los Angeles, 214, 218, 250–251 respiratory illnesses and, 291 waste disposal and, 216, 227–230 Air Quality Management Board (AQMD), 213, 226–227 Albuquerque

Index

census data for, 73–74, 80–81, 84–85 demographics of, 59 industrial sectors in, 214, 230 infrastructure in, 38 planning literature on, 7 residence patterns in, 264 settlement patterns in, 170 SWOP in, 221–222 urbanization pattern in, 270 American Indians. See Native Americans. Anaya, Toney, 286 apartments building of, 60, 95, 291 in civic centers, 165 in houses, 37, 96–97, 301 parking for, 91 AQMD. See Air Quality Management Board. Arizona “English Only” movement in, 295 Mesa, 155, 271 Phoenix. See Phoenix. Tucson. See Tucson. Ward Valley, 230 art, public display of graffiti as, 157 murals. See murals. in parks, 146–148, 154–155 protection of, 283 Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies, 141 Austin, 155 B Baldwin Park, 58, 215 banks business loans from, 58, 124–125, 128–129, 138 Civil Rights movement and, 68, 104 Community Reinvestment Act and, 93 credit from, 94, 97, 137 disinvestment strategy of, 93–94, 161 employment in, 104, 137–138 home loans from, 58, 68, 102–105 location of, 93 mortgages from. See mortgages. redlining by, 58, 68, 102–105, 124 vs. secondary lenders, 104 el barrio character of. See culture. driving factors in, 46 formation of, 40 legacy of, 18, 55, 153–157 as “state of mind,” 51, 56, 244

297

Index

298

typologies of, 34 Bauer, Catherine, 98, 163, 168 Bell Gardens, 242, 245 Belvedere Park, 152–153 blight, 163, 174–175 Bracero Program, 47, 52 Brown, Jerry, 247 Brownsville, 131, 227–230 businesses advertising by, 126, 136–137 CDCs and, 134, 182–183 city planning and, 302 Civil Rights movement and, 123, 127, 138 customers for, 122, 127, 172 in Empowerment Zones, 165, 185, 186–187, 254 in Enterprise Zones, 165, 185–187, 254 expansion of, 69, 125–128, 135–138, 142–143, 253, 274 HUD and, 130–131, 177–178 Jim Crow laws and, 122 language spoken in, 38–39, 126–128, 143–144 loans for. See loans, business. location of. See location, business. organizations for, 141 ownership of, 41 payment of, 60, 126–128 PPP and, 184–187 products offered by, 38–39, 121–122, 126 revitalization of, 108, 129–131, 292–293 set-aside programs and, 69 staffing of, 125–126, 165 supply networks for, 123 types of, 122, 274 wages paid by. See wages. Bustamante, Cruz, 259 C CAC. See Community Action Committees. California affirmative action initiatives, 259, 296 Baldwin Park, 59, 215 Bell Gardens, 242, 245 Belvedere Park, 152–153 Carson, 225–226 Casmalia, 215–216, 230 Chavez Ravine, 100–102, 239, 241 Chula Vista, 247 City of Industry, 215 city planning in, 248–250 Commerce. See City of Commerce. economy of, 253–255 El Monte, 59, 237, 278

Index

English Only movement in, 255, 295 Environmental Quality Act, 202–203, 209, 219 Hayward, 248 Hollywood, 245 Huntington Park, 132, 134–135, 164, 303 immigration initiative in, 25, 259, 296 Irwindale, 215 La Puente, 59, 215 “Law of the Indies” in, 30–31 Long Beach, 225, 245 Los Angeles. See Los Angeles. Macfarland, 215–216, 230 Malibu, 303–304 Mojave Desert, 251 Montebello, 59, 242, 245 Monterey, 30, 31, 43, 235 Monterey Park, 59, 242, 295 Moreno Valley, 70–71 National City, 247 Oakland, 246, 248 Orange County, 85–86, 265–266, 269 Pacoima, 165, 254 parks initiative in, 158, 256–257 Pasadena. See Pasadena. Pico Rivera. See Pico Rivera. political pluralism in, 248, 284, 286–287 Pomona, 244 population statistics for, 275 prisons in, 67, 212, 223–225 Proposition 12 in, 158, 256–257 Proposition 187 in, 25, 259, 296 Proposition 227 in, 259, 296 Proposition 225 in, 255, 295 Richmond, 248 Riverside, 246 Sacramento. See Sacramento. San Bernardino. See San Bernardino. San Diego. See San Diego. San Fernando Valley. See San Fernando Valley. San Francisco. See San Francisco. San Gabriel Valley. See San Gabriel Valley. San Joaquin Valley. See San Joaquin Valley. San Jose. See San Jose. San Pedro, 225–226 San Ysidro, 247 Santa Ana, 85–86, 265–266 Santa Barbara, 238, 280 Santa Monica, 245 settlement patterns in, 30–31, 235–236 Soledad Park, 152 Union City, 248 Ward Valley, 230

299

Index

300

Wilmington, 213, 225–227 candlelight marches, 224 Carson, 225–226 Casmalia, 215–216, 230 Catholic Church, 30, 205 CDBG. See Community Development Block Grant. CDCs. See Community Development Corporation. El Centro de Accion Social, 202–204, 209 Chavez Ravine, 100–102, 239, 241 Chicago School, 11, 12 Chicano Power movement, 47, 154, 242 Chicanos Por La Causa, 199 Chula Vista, 247 Cisneros, Henry, 131–133, 166, 182, 286 citizen advisory committees HUD and, 108–109, 179–180, 209 in San Bernardino, 196–197 Citizen Protective Action Committee (CPAC), 198–200 citizenship, 16–17, 258–259, 285 City of Commerce demographics of, 59, 245 pollution in, 78, 250 residence patterns in, 242 City of Industry, 215 city planning. See also rational-functional planning. advocacy planning movement in, 109–110, 191–196, 209, 277–278, 294 blight and, 174–175 in California, 248–250 CDBGs and, 109–110, 175, 294–295 clients of, 194 definition of, 109 environmental justice movements and, 212–213, 218–221, 230–234, 302–303 HUD and, 93, 109–110, 174–177, 193, 294 ideological role of, 193 income criteria and, 175–177, 306 management of, 178, 210, 292 multi-culturalism and, 267–268, 276–278, 284–285, 296–297, 299–301, 304–307 open space and, 303–304 racist policies in, 109–110, 191–196, 212–213, 293–295 recreation and, 151, 303–304 Settlement House movement and, 167–168 social justice movements and, 206–210, 278, 294–295, 301 War on Poverty and, 109–110, 174–177, 294, 304 civic centers air quality in, 251 in Albuquerque, 73, 80, 170 blight and, 175 CDBGs for, 175, 177, 294 commercial areas in, 111, 129–130, 178 in Denver, 73, 80–81 development of, 92, 164 economics of. See “trickle-down” economics.

Index

in El Paso, 40 eminent domain and, 20, 171, 178 failure of, 305 housing construction in, 165–166, 177 in Houston, 42 infrastructure for, 111 in Los Angeles, 44, 78, 83, 214, 216, 239 in Phoenix, 77, 80 property value in, 111, 164 residence patterns and, 73–83, 94 in San Antonio, 41, 75, 77–78, 181 in San Francisco, 43 in San Jose, 77, 81–82, 247 settlement patterns and, 40–44 social justice movements and, 292 sprawl and, 58–59 suburbia and, 64, 165, 274 in Tucson, 99, 170 War on Poverty and, 111 Civil Rights Act, 107, 285 Civil Rights movement banks and, 68, 104 businesses and, 123, 127, 138 eminent domain and, 49 GI Bill benefits and, 53 Johnson’s Model Cities program and, 50 mortgages and, 58, 68 public policies and, 106 redlining and, 68, 104 suburbia and, 26, 68, 272 urbanization patterns and, 5, 6 War on Poverty and, 50, 106, 163 Clean Air Act, 226–228 Clean Water Act, 228–230 cocaine, 66 colleges affirmative action and, 68, 137, 259 construction of, 58, 134, 182 EOP and, 137 GI Bill benefits and, 53 income levels and, 68 integration of, 69, 123–124 planning graduate programs in, 194 preparation for, 65–66, 238–239 Proposition 227 and, 259, 296 Title IX and, 158 War on Poverty and, 107 women in, 140 Colorado Denver. See Denver. Pueblo, 110 commercial areas. See also businesses.

301

Index

302

buildings in, 122, 139 CDBGs for, 175, 177 city planning and, 302 demographics and, 136 HUD and, 113–114, 130–131, 177–178 infrastructure in, 37, 122, 129–131, 270 Johnson’s Model Cities program and, 177 location of. See location, business. ownership in, 37, 39 parking in, 57 redevelopment and, 108, 181–183 suburbia and, 172 “trickle-down” economics and, 178–179 Communities Organized for Political Service (COPS), 42, 205 Community Action Committees (CAC), 163–164 Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) advocacy planning movement and, 109, 195 blight and, 174–175 citizen advisory committees and, 108–109, 180 city planning and, 109–110, 175, 294–295 for civic centers, 175, 177 establishment of, 107, 111 income criteria for, 113–115, 175–177 management of, 111–112, 161–162 nonprofit sector and, 116, 117–118 political control of, 108–113, 163, 174 project area committees and, 174 Community Development Corporations (CDCs), 134, 182–183 Community Reinvestment Act, 93 construction companies labor demand by, 45, 52, 60 ownership of, 39, 122 unionization of, 42 in WWII, 99 COPS. See Communities Organized for Political Service. Corona, Bert, 54, 241 Council on Environmental Quality, 219 covenants, 39, 105, 163 CPAC. See Citizen Protective Action Committee. Crusade for Justice, 19, 51, 192 Crystal City, 288 culture communal solidarity and, 94 forces in, 46 forms of, 18, 153–157 in neighborhood, 16, 55–56, 64, 145, 148–150, 158–159 outsider view of, 4, 54–55, 279–280 recreational space and, 145–149 social structure of, 3, 62, 255

Index

303

D Dallas, 270, 274, 300 density dumping, 291 Denver CDC in, 134, 182–183 census data for, 73–74, 80–81, 84–85 city planning in, 110, 300 college construction in, 58, 134, 182 commercial areas in, 131–134, 164, 166, 182 Crusade for Justice, 19, 51, 192 cultural centers in, 155 demographics of, 59 infrastructure in, 34, 38 NDC in, 134, 182–183 open space in, 151 planning literature on, 7 political pluralism in, 286 Poundstone Amendment and, 85 residence patterns in, 65 schools in, 85 urbanization pattern in, 270–271, 274, 301 Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) on blight, 174–175 businesses and, 130–131, 177–178 CACs, 163–164 CDBGs. See Community Development Block Grant. El Centro de Accion Social and, 202–203 citizen advisory committees and, 108–109, 179–180, 209 city planning and, 93, 109–110, 174–177, 193, 294 “Great Society” programs and, 92–93, 107, 172 income criteria for, 113–118, 175–177, 306 integration strategy of, 111–112 nonprofit sector and, 116, 117–118 program management by, 113, 116 project area committees and, 174 social justice movements and, 202–203, 207–209 War on Poverty. See War on Poverty. Depression Housing Act, 39, 98, 163, 169 infrastructure and, 37 New Deal legislation, 42, 97, 168–169 Settlement House movement and, 168–169 Diaz, Porfilio, 44–45 E Economic Opportunities Act (1964), 173 economics affirmative action and, 254 civic-center based. See “trickle-down” economics. consumer spending and, 136 education and, 256

Index

304

factors in, 35, 302 property values and, 35, 60 railroads, impact of, 149 social policies and, 63 wealth, distribution of, 253 education. See also colleges; schools. affirmative action and, 68, 137–138 bilingual, 65, 255, 295 economics and, 256 GI Bill benefits and, 53 Proposition 185 and, 25, 259, 296 Educational Opportunity Program (EOP), 137 EIA. See Environmental Impact Assessment. El Centro de Accion Social, 202–204, 209 El Monte, 59, 237, 279 El Paso city planning in, 110 demographics of, 31, 59 highways in, 218 industrial sectors in, 230 infrastructure in, 34, 38, 40 political pluralism in, 284, 287 residence patterns in, 65 settlement patterns in, 40–41 social justice movement in, 181 urbanization pattern in, 271–272, 301 wages in, 40 water system in, 213, 216 electricity, 31, 34, 36 eminent domain Civil Rights movement and, 49 legislation for, 99, 163 locations for, 58, 171 property values and, 100, 218 public housing and, 100 relocation subsidies and, 100, 218 social justice movements and, 197–200, 278, 289 for sports complexes, 101–102 “trickle-down” economics and, 179 employment. See also labor. affirmative action and, 68–69, 108 in banks, 104, 137–138 disinvestment strategy and, 253–254 Enterprise Zones and, 165, 185–186, 254 land ownership and, 32 local vs. regional, 125–126 PPP and, 184–186 set-aside programs and, 69 suburbia and, 172

Index

305

“trickle-down” economics and, 178–179 Empowerment Zones, 165, 185, 186–187, 254 English Only movement, 65, 255, 295 Enterprise Zones, 165, 185–187, 254 environment. See also environmental justice movements. air pollution. See air quality. class and, 278 in industrial sectors, 211–214 PPP and, 185–186 sprawl and, 12, 16, 70, 71 urban vs. wilderness, 217, 232, 303 Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), 199–200, 303 environmental justice movements. See also social justice movements. AQMD and, 213, 226–227 birth defects and, 213, 216, 227–230 cancer-related illness and, 211, 214–216, 229–230 city planning and, 212–213, 218–221, 230–234, 302–303 Crusade for Justice and, 51 highways and, 216–217 landfills and, 213, 215–216, 227–232 LCSC and, 226–227 MELA and, 212, 223–225 NAFTA and, 213, 228 planning literature on, 19 platform of, 222 SNEEJ and, 213, 221–223 SWOP and, 221–222 Environmental Policy Act (1969), 198 Environmental Protection Act, 202–203, 219 Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), 219 ethnic groups covenants and, 39, 105 sprawl and, 26, 49 Euro-Americans family size of, 58 political philosophy of, 288–289 F family size credit and, 127–128 vs. Euro-Americans, 58 recreational systems and, 146, 151 redlining and, 105 residence patterns and, 62 settlement patterns and, 36, 37 wage structure and, 35 Fannie Mae, 52 Federal Housing Administration (FHA), 39 fiestas

Index

306

consultants for, 140, 283 in Los Angeles, 244 in parks, 22, 145, 148–150 sprawl and, 283 flood control. See also storm drain systems. in San Antonio, 205 settlement patterns and, 32, 34 street paving and, 36 Fort Worth, 270, 275, 300 freeways. See highways. G gangs economy, impact on, 66 illegal drugs and, 66, 157 prisons and, 255 property values and, 66–67, 256 recreational facilities and, 66, 147–148, 150–151, 157 schools and, 293 suburbia and, 244, 256, 275 gas lines environmental justice movements and, 213, 225–227 installation of, 36 planning policies and, 4 in San Antonio, 204–205 GI Bill benefits, 53 GI Forum, 50 government contracts affirmative action and, 69, 123, 126, 135, 138–139 set-aside programs and, 69 small businesses and, 126 graffiti, 157 “Great Society” programs, 92–93, 107, 172 H Hayward, 248 highways. See also streets. environmental justice movements and, 216–217 Neighborhood Action Committee on, 224 parks and, 151, 153, 181 property values and, 70–71 residence patterns and, 52–53, 58, 171–172, 211–212, 217–219 settlement patterns and, 37, 42 social justice movements and, 180–181, 196–197, 224 suburbia and, 171–172 Hispanic Business, 142 Hispanic Chamber of Commerce (U.S.), 141 Hollywood, 245 homelessness, 12, 93, 118

Index

307

housing abandonment of, 71, 96 architectural regulations for, 167 building codes for, 95–97, 167–168, 291 construction materials for, 31, 42 nonprofit sector and, 116, 117–118 ownership of, 21, 91, 96 rental. See rental properties; renting vs. ownership. size of. See size, home. types of. See types, housing. valuation of. See values, property. Housing Act (1934) covenants and, 163 segregation and, 39 Settlement House movement and, 98, 163, 169 Houston air quality in, 214 city planning in, 110 demographics of, 59 infrastructure in, 31, 38, 264 planning literature on, 7 residence patterns in, 264–265 settlement patterns in, 42–43 unions in, 42 urbanization pattern in, 274 War on Poverty and, 114 zoning in, 42 HUD. See Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Huntington Park, 132, 134–135, 164, 303 I IAF. See Industrial Areas Foundation. immigration Bracero Program, 47, 52 music on, 157 Proposition 185 and, 25, 259, 296 railroads and, 29 in Rio Grande Valle, 228 Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF), 204–205 industrial sectors air quality in, 211, 213–214, 225–227 in Albuquerque, 214, 230 cancer-related illness and, 211, 214–216 in El Paso, 230 environment in, 211–214 IAF and, 204–205 land in, 211 in Los Angeles, 214–215, 218, 230 on Mexico-USA border, 213–214, 221, 228–230 PPP and, 184–186

Index

308

residence patterns and, 211, 213–215, 291 in San Gabriel Valley, 215 schools and, 211, 214–215, 225–227 settlement patterns and, 37 water systems in, 211 Irwindale, 215 J Jim Crow laws, 50, 122 Johnson, Lyndon B. civil rights legislation and, 106–107 “Great Society” programs, 92–93, 107, 172 Model Cities Program, 50, 59, 173, 177 War on Poverty. See War on Poverty. Juarez, 213 K King, Rodney, 9, 11 Krumholtz, Norman, 195 L labor. See also employment. colonial system of, 30, 228, 235 pre-colonial, 3 unionization and. See unions, labor. Labor Community Strategy Center (LCSC), 226–227 land. See also property. in industrial sectors, 211 ownership of, 4, 32 royal grants for, 30, 149 valuation of. See values, land. landfills, 213, 215–216, 227–231 La Prensa, 41 La Puente, 59, 215 Laredo, 110, 216, 227–230 Las Cruces, 110 Las Vegas (Nevada), 70, 71 Las Vegas (New Mexico), 31, 40 “Law of the Indies,” 30, 31 LCSC. See Labor Community Strategy Center. legal aid societies, 96 Levittown, 100 literature collectives, formation of, 156 planning, critique of, 6–15 topics for, 156 tradition of, 154 loans, business from banks, 58, 124–125, 128–129, 138

Index

Civil Rights movement and, 138 denial of, 128 in Denver, 134, 183 eminent domain and, 201 Enterprise Zones and, 165 in Pasadena, 201 in Pico Rivera, 184 PPP and, 184–185 redlining of, 124 requirements for, 125 from SBA, 124, 129, 138 secondary sources of, 128–129 terms for, 125 location, business Enterprise Zones and, 165, 185–187, 254 in homes, 38–39, 95 HUD and, 111 infrastructure and, 37, 122, 129–130 PPP and, 184–186 settlement patterns and, 32 suburbia and, 172, 270, 274 zoning and, 95 Long Beach, 225, 245 Lopez, Humberto, 140–141 Los Angeles air quality in, 214, 218, 250–251 businesses in, 127, 139–141 census data for, 73–76, 78–79, 82–85, 243 Chinatown in, 33, 46, 217, 239–240 City Housing Authority, 54, 241 city planning in, 300 commercial areas in, 131–133 cultural centers in, 154–155 demographics of, 45, 59, 73, 238–246 Empowerment Zones in, 165 Enterprise Zones in, 165 Fiesta on Broadway, 280 flooding in, 239–240 gangs in, 66, 218, 244 highways in, 52–53, 217–219, 243 housing budget in, 251–252 Housing Crisis Task Force, 116 industrial sectors in, 214–215, 218, 230 MELA in, 212, 223–225 open space in, 151, 255, 303 parks in, 152–153, 255, 304 planning literature on, 7–15 political pluralism in, 87, 248, 284, 287 prisons in, 212, 223–225 public housing in, 54, 100–102, 241 public transportation in, 239, 252 railroads in, 46, 217, 239

309

Index

310

recreational facilities in, 150–151 redevelopment in, 46 residence patterns in, 58–59, 64–65, 238–246, 251–252, 264 Rivera murals for, 154 schools in, 214–215, 225–227, 238–239, 242, 245 settlement patterns in, 32–33, 44–46, 170, 235–240 Sleepy Lagoon case, 241 sports complexes in, 101–102, 241 sprawl in, 9, 12–15, 45 urbanization pattern in, 266, 268–270, 274, 301 Zoot Suit Riots in, 55, 237–238, 241 Los Angeles Times, 236 M MacAllen, 216, 227–230 Macfarland, 215–216, 230 Las Madres de Este Los Angeles (MELA), 212, 223–225 Las Madres de la Plaza, 224 Magon, Enrique and Ricardo, 44–45, 236–237 Malibu, 303–304 manufacturing affirmative action and, 68 city planning and, 233 environmental impact of, 211, 213–215, 225, 231 factors in, 254 PPP and, 184–186 residence patterns and, 92, 211, 214–215, 218, 225 schools and, 214–215 settlement patterns and, 31–33, 239 wages for, 66 maquiladora zones California and, 247 Texas and, 213, 221, 230 Martinez, Raul, 139 McDonald’s, 143 McNichols, Bill, 133 meat packing plants, 41 MELA. See Las Madres de Este Los Angeles. Mesa, 155, 271 methamphetamine, 66 Mexico Diaz regime in, 44–45 maquiladora zones in, 213, 221, 230, 247 NAFTA, 213, 221, 228 Rio Grande Valle. See Rio Grande Valle. urbanization pattern in, 228 USA, border with, 213–214 waste disposal in, 216, 228–230 Michel, Oralia, 140 mining, 31 Model Cities program (Johnson’s), 50, 59, 173, 177

Index

311

Mojave Desert, 251 Molina, Gloria, 153, 224, 257, 287 Montebello, 59, 242, 245 Monterey, 30, 31, 43, 235 Monterey Park, 59, 242, 295 Moreno Valley, 70–71 mortgages Civil Rights movement and, 58, 68 covenants and, 39, 105 defaulting on, 71 fees for, 104–105 FHA and, 39 interest rates for, 68, 103–105 New Deal and, 168–169 redlining and, 58, 68, 102–105 secondary lenders of, 104–105 tax subsidies and, 171–172 movies, 68 murals funding for, 148, 280 graffiti and, 157 Mural movement, 147–148, 154–155, 157 political, 154, 243 preservation of, 148 by Rivera, 154 youth programs and, 280 music banda, 156 Fiesta on Broadway, 280 at fiestas, 279–280 styles of, 155–156 Tejano Music Festival, 182, 280 topics for, 156–157 N NAFTA. See North American Free Trade Agreement. National City, 247 National Environmental Policy Act (1969), 198 National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA), 202–203, 219 National Housing Act. See Housing Act (1934). National Resources Defense Council, 224 Native Americans in California, 235 settlement patterns of, 3, 5, 29 NDC. See Newsed Development Corporation. Neighborhood Action Committees, 224 NEPA. See National Environmental Protection Act. Nevada, Las Vegas, 70, 71 New Deal legislation, 42, 97, 168–169 New Mexico Albuquerque. See Albuquerque.

Index

312

demographics of, 73 environmental justice movements in, 213 land conflicts in, 213 Las Cruces, 110 Las Vegas, 31, 40 political pluralism in, 286 Santa Fe, 283 new urbanism, 15–17, 305 New York City, 252 Newsed Development Corporation (NDC), 134, 182–183 nomad capitalism, 300 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 213, 221, 228 O Oakland, 246, 248 open space. See also parks; recreation. art in, 146–148, 154–155 availability of, 145–153, 157–159, 256–257 city planning and, 303–304 Proposition 12 and, 158, 256–257 vs. public buildings, 54, 152–153 Settlement House movement and, 167 sprawl and, 70, 151 youth programs in, 66, 146–152, 255–256 Orange County (CA), 85–86, 265–266, 269 P Pacoima, 165, 254 parks. See also open space; recreation. art in, 146–148, 154–155 availability of, 145–153 development of, 151 fiestas in, 22, 145, 148–150 funding for, 157, 256 highways and, 151, 153, 181 infrastructure of, 148 maintenance of, 255 planning policies and, 4 Proposition 12 (CA), 158, 256–257 vs. public buildings, 152–153 Partido Liberal Mexicano (PLM), 44–45, 236 Pasadena Brookside Park in, 201 El Centro de Accion Social and, 202–204, 209 eminent domain in, 171, 179 media coverage in, 203 schools in, 201

Index

313

social justice movement in, 181, 192, 201–204, 209 PASSO. See Political Association of Spanish Speaking Organizations. Pena, Frederico, 131–134, 166, 286 Phoenix airport expansion in, 77, 99, 198–200 census data for, 76–77, 80, 84–85 Chicanos Por La Causa in, 199 city planning in, 300 CPAC in, 198–200 demographics of, 59 highways in, 218, 264 infrastructure in, 34, 38 planning literature on, 7 political pluralism in, 287 residence patterns in, 65, 199 schools in, 200 social justice movement in, 181, 192, 198–200, 209 urbanization pattern in, 270–271, 274, 301 WALA Project in, 198–199 Pico Rivera census data for, 76 city planning in, 300 commercial areas in, 131, 133, 164, 183–184 political leadership of, 164 residence patterns in, 58–59, 65, 242 planners. See city planning. planning commissions, 194 PLM. See Partido Liberal Mexicano. police eviction by, 102, 241 facilities for, 54, 152–153 Zoot Suit Riots and, 241 Political Association of Spanish Speaking Organizations (PASSO), 204 politics advertising for, 285 barriers to, 283, 285, 293–294 in California, 257–260 coalitions and, 283, 287–291, 296–297 fund raising for, 278 pluralism in, 87, 205, 248, 284–285 redistricting and, 258, 285–286 term limits and, 25–26, 257, 259, 286–287 urban policies and, 272–273, 276–278 voting. See voting. Pomona, 244 population statistics for 1880–1945 time period, 46 1970 Census, 71–76 1980 Census, 72, 76–79 2000 Census, 71, 72, 79–84 Poundstone Amendment, 85 poverty

Index

314

CDBGs and, 113–114 families in, 60, 201 PPP. See Public/Private Partnerships. prisons in California, 67, 212, 223–225 minorities in, 255 private industry councils, 185 produce markets, 39, 41 property. See housing; land; values, property. Proposition 12 (CA), 158, 256–257 Proposition 187 (CA), 25, 259, 296 Proposition 227 (CA), 259, 296 Proposition 225 (CA), 255, 295 public housing creation of, 97 eminent domain and, 100 HUD and, 118 legislation for. See Housing Act (1934). in Los Angeles, 54, 100 occupants of, 53, 100 protests against, 51 in San Antonio, 42 Public/Private Partnerships (PPP), 184–187 public transportation in Los Angeles, 239, 252 residence patterns and, 94 resources for, 301–302 riders on, 38, 293 Pueblo (Colorado), 110 pueblos, 3, 5, 29, 149 R railroads economics and, 149 redevelopment and, 46 settlement patterns and, 29, 31–32, 41 stations for, 37, 46, 217 rational-functional planning vs. advocacy movement, 109–110, 191, 194–196 basis of, 18, 194 HUD programs and, 93, 109–110 racist policies of, 109–110, 191 restructuring of, 267 social justice movements and, 207 La Raza Unida Party, 258 real estate industry density dumping by, 291 Depression and, 168–169 development fees and, 291 legislation for. See Housing Act (1934). redlining and, 58, 68, 102–105

Index

315

speculation by, 94, 116, 169–170, 291 sprawl and, 70–71 suburbia and, 68, 94 War on Poverty and, 304 in WWII, 99 recreation art, humanities, and, 147–148, 154–157 city planning and, 151, 303–304 funding for, 147–148, 151–152, 157 seniors, programs for, 151 Settlement House movement and, 167 sports, support for, 147, 158 youth, programs for, 66, 146–152, 157–158, 255–256, 293 redlining, 58, 68, 102–105, 124 Regeneracion, 44 rental properties abandonment of, 96 business location and, 38–39, 122 code enforcement in, 96 demand for, 94 discriminatory tactics and, 94 investment in, 57, 96 landlord abuse in, 95–96, 167 legislation for, 69 maintenance of, 96 property values and, 60, 95 residence patterns and, 275–276 segregation and, 94 settlement patterns and, 32 in suburbs, 275–276 renting vs. ownership housing values and, 21 HUD and, 176 land values and, 91 maintenance and, 96 redlining and, 102–105 relocation subsidies and, 100, 218 Richmond, 248 Rio Grande Valle, 213, 216, 227–230, 303 Rivera, Diego, 154 Riverside, 246 Robinson, Jackie, 201 Roybal, Ed, 238, 241, 257 Roybal-Allard, Lucille, 224 S Sacramento cultural centers in, 155 demographics of, 59 public transportation in, 252–253, 264 residence patterns in, 65, 246–247

Index

316

settlement patterns in, 31, 43, 235 urbanization pattern in, 270, 274 San Antonio census data for, 73–79, 82–85 city planning in, 300 commercial areas in, 131–133, 164, 166, 181–182 COPS in, 42, 205 cultural centers in, 155 demographics of, 31, 42, 59 highways in, 42, 218 housing in, 42, 95 IAF in, 204–205 infrastructure in, 34, 38, 42, 182, 204–205 PASSO in, 204 political pluralism in, 286, 287 public housing in, 42 residence patterns in, 265 settlement patterns in, 41–42, 170 social justice movement in, 192, 204–205 sports complexes in, 182 Tejano Music Festival, 182, 280 tuberculosis in, 31 urbanization pattern in, 270–272, 274, 301 San Bernardino census data for, 83 citizen advisory committees in, 196–197 highways in, 196–197 project area committees in, 197–198 social justice movement in, 180, 181, 192, 196–198, 209 WHTA and, 197–198, 209 San Diego cultural centers in, 154–155 demographics of, 59 economic development in, 247 highways in, 180–181, 218 policy protests in, 51 public transportation in, 252–253 residence patterns in, 65, 246–247 settlement patterns in, 170 social justice movement in, 180–181 suburbs in, 251 San Fernando Valley census data for, 76, 78, 83–84 demographics of, 244–245 LCSC in, 226 political pluralism in, 284 San Francisco BART subway system in, 205–206 city planning in, 300 coalitions in, 283–284 cultural centers in, 155 demographics of, 246

Index

317

open space in, 151 political pluralism in, 87, 205 residence patterns in, 247–248 settlement patterns in, 31, 43–44, 170, 235 social justice movement in, 192, 205 San Gabriel Valley census data for, 76, 78, 83–84 demographics of, 244–245 industrial sectors in, 215 residence patterns in, 65, 240 suburbs in, 59 San Joaquin Valley, 257 San Jose census data for, 76–77, 81–82, 84–85 commercial areas in, 131 cultural centers in, 155 demographics of, 59 highways in, 218 public transportation in, 253 residence patterns in, 65, 246–248 social justice movement in, 192 urbanization pattern in, 270, 274, 301 San Pedro, 225–226 San Ysidro, 247 Santa Ana, 85–86, 265–266 Santa Barbara, 238, 279 Santa Fe, 283 Santa Monica, 245 SBA. See Small Business Administration. SBLDF. See Sierra Blanca Legal Defense Fund. schools. See also colleges; education. critique of, 65–66, 293 density dumping and, 291 in Denver, 85 dropout rate in, 65, 255–256 eminent domain and, 200 English Only movement and, 255, 295 folklorico performances in, 155 immigration initiatives and, 25, 259, 296 industrial sectors and, 211, 214–215, 225–227 integration of, 69, 85, 137, 201 language spoken in, 65, 255, 295 in Los Angeles, 214–215, 225–227, 238–239, 242, 245 in Pasadena, 201 in Phoenix, 200 PICs and, 185 Poundstone Amendment and, 85 property values and, 71, 200 Proposition 185 and, 25, 259, 296 Proposition 225 and, 255, 295

Index

318

sprawl and, 70 vocational counseling in, 140, 238–239 Settlement House movement, 42, 97–98, 162–163, 166–169 sewer systems disease and, 36 in El Paso, 36, 40 installation of, 36 planning policies and, 4 in San Antonio, 95, 204–205 settlement patterns and, 32, 34 speculation and, 170 in suburbs, 171 sidewalks, 22, 36, 42 Sierra Blanca, 213, 216, 231–232 Sierra Blanca Legal Defense Fund (SBLDF), 232 Simkovitch, Mary, 98, 168 size, home capital availability and, 95 residence patterns and, 67 in San Antonio, 42 settlement patterns and, 36, 37, 42 in suburbs, 58 wage structure and, 35 Sleepy Lagoon case, 241 Small Business Administration (SBA), 124, 129, 138 SNEEJ. See Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice. social justice movements. See also environmental justice movements. background on, 191–192 case studies of, 180–181, 192, 196–206 citizen advisory committees and, 180 city planning and, 206–210, 278, 294–295, 301 civic centers and, 292 coalitions and, 289–290 eminent domain and, 197–200, 278, 289 factors in, 192 focus of, 163, 192, 258 goals of, 299 highways and, 180–181, 196–197, 224 planning literature on, 7, 8, 19 platform of, 180 redevelopment and, 180–181 Settlement House, 42, 97–98, 162–163, 166–169 Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers, 141 Soledad Park, 152 Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice (SNEEJ), 213, 221–223 Southwest Organizing Project (SWOP), 221–222 Southwest Voters Registration Project, 291 sports complexes building of, 101–102, 300 Title IX and, 158 youth programs in, 147, 158

Index

sprawl census data and, 72 civic centers and, 58–59 definition of, 58 environment and, 12, 16, 70, 71 ethnicity and, 26, 49, 263 in Las Vegas, 70 in Los Angeles, 9, 12–15 new urbanism and, 16 open space and, 70, 151 schools and, 70 stockyards, 41 storm drain systems, 3, 38, 205. See also flood control. streets. See also highways. in commercial zones, 37, 122, 129–130 in El Paso, 40 flood control and, 36 in Houston, 42 location and, 36–38 in Los Angeles, 240 planning policies and, 4, 96 as play areas, 149, 158 in San Antonio, 42, 95, 204–205 settlement patterns and, 32, 34 social construction on, 145 Student Blowouts (1968), 225, 255, 257–258 suburbia access to, 92 census data and, 72 civic centers and, 64, 165 Civil Rights movement and, 26, 68 class and, 5–6, 26–27, 272–276 construction of, 52 culture of, 149 failure of, 16–17, 275–276 Fannie Mae and, 52 GI Bill benefits and, 53 growth control movements in, 275, 278, 295 highways and, 171–172 infrastructure for, 38, 51, 71, 171–172, 276 integration of, 94, 111, 283 location of, 71 migration to, impact of, 64 poverty in, 117 quality-of-life issues in, 273 zoning and, 91 SWOP. See Southwest Organizing Project.

319

Index

320

T Taco Bell, 143 taxes Enterprise Zones and, 165 mortgages and, 171–172 PPP and, 184–186 tax shelters, 117–118 telephones, 36 television (tv), 68 Telles, Raymond, 284 term limits, 25–26, 257, 259, 286–287 Texas Austin, 155 Brownsville, 131, 227–230 Crystal City, 288 Dallas, 270, 274, 300 demographics of, 73 El Paso. See El Paso. English Only movement in, 295 environmental justice movements in, 213, 216, 227–232 Fort Worth, 270, 274, 300 Laredo, 110, 216, 227–230 MacAllen, 216, 227–230 plazas in, 150 Rio Grande Valle. See Rio Grande Valle. San Antonio. See San Antonio. Sierra Blanca, 213, 216, 231–232 Title IX, requirements of, 158 trash collection in El Paso, 36, 40 provision of, 36 Settlement House movement and, 97, 167 “trickle-down” economics CDBGs and, 114 in commercial areas, 130, 136, 164, 177–179, 304–305 employment and, 178–179 failure of, 117, 302 nonprofit sector and, 120 redlining and, 293 tuberculosis, 31, 36 Tucson city planning in, 110, 300 eminent domain in, 171, 179 infrastructure in, 38 “people removal” in, 99 residence patterns in, 65 settlement patterns in, 170 social justice movement in, 181, 192 types, housing apartments. See apartments. densification and, 95 new urbanism and, 17

Index

property values and, 91 residence patterns and, 60 settlement patterns and, 36–37 zoning and, 91, 95 U UFW Union. See United Farm Workers Union. Union City, 248 unions, labor in Houston, 42 income levels and, 57, 68 political support from, 288 in Rio Grande Valley, 228 Rivera murals for, 154 voter registration and, 291 women and, 237 United Farm Workers (UFW) Union, 242, 257–258 urban studies bureau, 163 V values, land capital investment and, 29 confiscation and, 32 densification and, 95, 252 economics and, 71 eminent domain and, 100 home ownership and, 91 infrastructure and, 34, 42 integration and, 112 in Moreno Valley, 71 rents and, 60, 95 segregation and, 67 speculation and, 94 subsidies and, 176 wage structure and, 35 values, property appreciation rates, 5, 67, 94 ceiling on, 94 in civic centers, 111, 164 eminent domain and, 100, 218 gangs and, 66–67, 256 highways and, 70–71 infrastructure and, 70–71, 96, 204 ownership and, 21 redlining and, 103, 105 rents and, 60, 95 schools and, 71 subsidies and, 176 transportation and, 70–71 zoning and, 91 Vietnam War, 108

321

Index

322

Villaraigosa, Antonio, 284 voting political pluralism and, 291 racist policies on, 285–286 registration for, 257, 259 Southwest Voters Registration Project, 291 Voting Rights Act, 107, 285 W wages affirmative action and, 68–69 from barrio businesses, 126 ceiling on, 40 cost-of-living and, 66 in El Paso, 40 in Los Angeles, 237 for manufacturing jobs, 66 property values and, 35, 60 WALA Project. See West Approach Land Acquisition. War on Poverty. See also Affirmative action. blight and, 174–175 CACs and, 163–164 CDBGs. See Community Development Block Grant. city planning and, 109–110, 174–177, 294, 304 civic centers and, 111 Civil Rights movement and, 50, 106, 163 colleges and, 107 goals of, 107–108, 172–173 income criteria for, 113–118, 175–177 political control of, 108–113, 173–174 real estate industry and, 304 redlining and, 104 youth, programs for, 66 Ward Valley, 230 water systems Clean Water Act and, 228–230 in commercial zones, 22 in El Paso, 40 in Houston, 31 in industrial sectors, 211 installation of, 36 landfills and, 213, 229–231 planning policies and, 4 in San Antonio, 95, 204–205 settlement patterns and, 32, 34 speculation and, 170 in suburbs, 171 West Approach Land Acquisition (WALA) Project, 198–199 Western Center on Law and Poverty, 202 Westside Homeowners and Tenants Association (WHTA), 197–198, 209

Index

323

Wilmington, 213, 225–227 Wilson, Pete, 25, 257, 259, 296 women businesses owned by, 139, 254–255 on citizen committees, 108, 233 recreation programs for, 291 Settlement House movement and, 42, 97–98, 162–163 sports and, 158 Title IX and, 158 in workforce, 40, 236 Wood, Edith Elmer, 98, 168 World War II GI Bill benefits from, 53 housing during, 98, 99 infrastructure and, 37 Zoot Suit Riots during, 55 Z zoning business location 38–39 122–123 density dumping and, 291 in Houston, 42 PPP and, 185 property values and, 91 residence patterns and, 37, 95 Zoot Suit Riots 55, 237–238